The Infinite and the Eternal
by Lyceris
Summary: 525 Cores were made. 475 are Infinite Stratos Cores, the other 50 disappeared. Some have reappeared. What do Stratos do? They fly and they fight. Rating will change at author discretion.
1. Summer 0 - Prologue

Summer 0 - Prologue

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS  
**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

A scientist imagines what his family are doing in Italy. A rolling storm comes overhead, but it's far enough away that he doesn't mind it. All of the soldiers, however, panic and run out the door, pulling weapons and armour as they go. Yelling is heard, and the general alarm goes off.

"All hands to battle stations! All hands to battle stations! Repeat, this base is under attack! All hands to battle stations!"

He thinks nothing of it, and continues with his research. The core of his research lies in front of him, in sensory isolation – IS Core #256.

One of the wondrous devices that powers an Infinite Stratos, an IS Core generates so much power it could power the US – _is_ powering the US. Of course, it is also the source of great conflict, with only 467 known cores available. Their inventor, Tabane Shinonono, has only released that many, and only because of the Alaska Treaty.

The noise continues coming even closer, the loud noises of rounds firing encroaching up behind him. He starts pondering whether to leave – but it's too late, the decision is made for him. The door is busted down – a black IS comes in with two shotguns in hand. A glance at the slaughterer shows a machine with a thickened leg, a half-skirt and two protective shoulder spaulders hovering away from the body. The body itself looks like thin pilot armour, following over the body's contours. Fleeting thoughts about a corrupted Shirokishi (the first IS shown to the world) pass through the scientist's mind.

A shotgun is pushed to his crown jewels. "Phantom Task scientist, Kurei Kazuki. Core 256. Where is it." It's pushed in a little further, and the finger nears the trigger.

"I-It's right behind me! Please don't pull the trigger! I have family!" Kurei's pants dampen a little, and a small puddle of urine forms underneath him. The shotgun's pushed even further in – his mind belatedly realising it's now pointing up his body instead of perpendicular to it. A shell is fired.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

Accessing File: Cores

I created 525 cores. Of those 525, I released 465 cores to the world, one to Chi-chan, one to Ikkun, one to Houki-chan and two to their friends. I kept five to give to those I care about, but the other fifty…

The other fifty disappeared from home. I found what took them…but I could never get them back. I made a machine, two days before, to create AIs. It…took those fifty cores and made AIs within them. To all who go near those fifty cores, I worry for your safety, unless you're one who's friendly with them.

-Tabane Shinonono, Everyone's Favourite Mad Genius

Closing File  
Last modified: 9 APRIL 2125

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note: Alright, let's get this done.

I'm a completely new writer! As such, _be prepared for this to be pretty bad_. I haven't read the IS LNs, so I'm basing a lot of what I know from existing fanfics. As such…don't expect this to stick to canon. Well, actually, I personally don't consider much past Season 1 to be canon – Phantom Task obviously still exists and most of the events will still occur, but it will start to deviate heavily once it gets to about…well, rather far in the future. It'll also get pretty gruesome by then, so I'll just start it off with a rating of M. Sadly, the question I kind of wanted to ask with this story will also have to wait until then. Of course, the next episode's most likely going to be an exposition dump.


	2. Autumn 1 - Meeting of Two

Autumn 1 – Meeting of Two

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **September 19th, 20XX**

 **? POV**

I glance around the area. Even if Char has already confirmed there are no enemies here, I will still make sure there is no-one here, not after the last time we were ambushed. That woman over there is looking at the dresses – quite well-made dresses, they've got lavender flower patterns– and her husband, I think, is watching over her to make sure she doesn't get hurt. He seems to dote on her, even if females hold most of the power in this world now.

Of course, a single female without one of our younger sisters would be nothing for a group of males. Although they don't seem to be armed, I'll still stray away from them – although, it is unnaturally quiet out here, with so few people in this shopping mall. Usually it's busier than this, but the recent terrorist attacks by Phantom Task have stopped most of society from going out and congregating into groups. It wouldn't limit their actions though, only harm the economy – businesses slowly dying because nobody'll purchase anything. Still though, some businesses hang on to dear life. That café is one of them.

Charlemagne's sitting on the side of the café, two coffees in front of her. It's quiet – the waiter is cleaning the coffee machine endlessly and reading off his phone. There's some background music, but it only adds to the ambient atmosphere. I sit down across from Char, wooden seat creaking, and reach for a coffee. She pushes it into my reach, and I duck down for a sip. Her red hair shifts as she leans back into her seat.

 **[Choose your own background music, preferably something soft and non-distracting]**

"It's been a while since we last met, Kuron. Did you buy new shoes? These ones don't make much noise." We both settle into observation of each other while our coffees let off a little steam.

"Yes. Well, you said my last ones made me too loud for your liking. I have some news, but has Shirone passed any on yet? She's been surprisingly quiet." Char's eyes light up at the sound of news, but settles down when I ask about Shirone.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

"Shirone's been surprisingly quiet. I still have some news about her though – have you heard of IS Academy?" She's leaning over the table, one hand extended. Her Eternal 12 is sitting in it – a sleek black phone with a protective casing. A video of an IS Academy duel's shown on it, a white IS facing off against a blue IS.

"Everyone has on this side of the world. Is that Orimura Ichika's duel for class rep?" One moves between the other's laser shots, raising a large sword before stopping.

"Yes. Ichika's apparently Shirone's partner. It seems like Tabane did go through with her plan. Do note that he's using a sword, and only one sword. It's a Yukihira – Yukihira Nigata. You do know what this means, right?" My eyes widen. The Yukihira is the perfect weapon for single-target assassinations. Seen once before with Orimura Chifuyu's _Kurazakura_ , it is a sword designed for duels, although it is far more effective with the One-Off Ability Reiraku Byakuya, an energy-neutralizing field that uses shield energy to power itself.

"You have confirmed this? She knows that Shirone is one of us Forgotten Knights, and is a pseudo-Eternal herself with her open IS AI. If she's organized this, then she's doing something to help us." A pseudo Infinite-Eternal Stratos, Shirokishi has both the power of an Eternal Stratos and the form of an Infinite Stratos. Tabane has simply taken the power and condensed it into a single weapon – Reiraku Byakuya. Only one other confirmed machine has held this power before, even if it is currently frozen - Kurazakura.

"Yes, I confirmed it visually myself. I took the footage, and if that doesn't mean enough to you, here's IS Academy's files on Byakushiki." My E12 beeps – files have been transferred. I digitally transfer them, ensuring integrity by scanning it with anti-virus suites. Cyberwarfare suites scan the file, ripping copies of the file apart, looking for hostile intentions – all ES take care of their own cyber-security, due to their lives being made of code. Once complete, a glance at the data shows a full IS Academy breakdown of the suit.

"'Yukihira Nigata, a 1.4 m blade that when charged with Reiraku Byakuya will instantly enable the Absolute Barrier to ensure the pilot's safety, draining all shield points in the process.' Tabane, why have you done this…Oh, and his opponent?" I switch to the information on his opponent.

"The pilot's Cecilia Alcott, flying a suit with BiTs equipped. They're rather low-level BiTs in comparison to ours, but they're equipped with lightweight lasers totalling around 50 points per hit, distance and shield resistance uncounted. Four of those, and then two missile launchers and her main weapon, a plasma sniper rifle." I glance back to the footage of her fighting – it's almost a dance of danmaku, only not coordinated at all. A bull chasing after a fairy with four points of attack, in a china shop. Not what you want to see on the battlefield.

"Called Blue Pierce, it deals roughly 100 points her bit, shield resistance uncounted. Range doesn't seem to matter in a close-range duel but it may still be a factor at further ranges. She doesn't use it when using her BiTs to fire, I think the English may have forgotten something when coding her BiTs because we give ours simple commands. If the English were copying our BiT control system, it would've been a simple 'flank and covering fire'..." Char continues blathering on about control systems while I examine the missile launchers used on the Blue Tears. They're self-manufacturing units, capable of one output per ten seconds. However, it can hold two while preparing to create a third – essentially, it can fire three in a single barrage before having to reload over the course of thirty seconds.

Compared to my own Tsunami drunk missile launchers, their missiles can do more damage individually and reload faster. However, they're worse in almost every other respect – less damage than a full cluster, less missile types and slower firing speeds. Since my Tsunamis never fire individual missiles and always fire their full cluster, I'd say the Blue Tears would hit harder if its four missiles launched and hit together, but would almost instantly lose once two full clusters hit it. After all, a cluster of eight drunk mini-missiles, each capable of 45 points, hitting a single target would deal around 400 points. Two is enough to put most little sisters down, let alone the full list of sixteen in Eternal form or 128 in Stratos form.

"…so if anything, the English engineers screwed up by giving her full control of her BiTs." Char stops talking after about a minute of tuning her out. She pouts, having noticed my eyes focus again. "You completely tuned me out, didn't you? No matter, no matter."

"Well, I think that's enough about Shirone's own work. She'll probably overhear us and tell us to shut up if we went any further, anyways. Do you want to hear about the news I gathered recently? It's quite interesting in my opinion."

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

"Of course! Your news is always about the bounty-hunting business we're both in. How does it go by the way? The tip I give catch you a new fry?" We start slipping into code. Although we're both rather carefree about Phantom Task overhearing us, considering there's no-one else here, it's more for public opinion that we don't actively discuss killing others. Making sure PT's information network doesn't overhear any juicy details is a side-effect.

"Yes, actually. I caught myself one juicy bounty, and I got a few more clues on some of his friends." Haven't checked any out, but they should all be valid bounties.

"Of course they would be! Come on, tell me of some of them. My blades haven't been cleaned recently, and I want to make sure there's a reason to." For Char, cleaning her blades on the bodies of her enemies is a good way to ensure it says red. Her broadsword doesn't rust due to its composition, so the red colour works well as a psychological weapon.

"Calm down, calm down. I was always going to give you some of the clues. One of his friends is in Nepal, with one of that person's subordinates in Thailand, kicking up a fuss. Another friend is in Spain, his most trusted in France and one of her more renowned in British lands. Sadly, there's no information on his best friend – information on that fellow has been poorly lacking, wherever we look." An information hub in Spain and Nepal would be perfect to hit, but the Thailand and France surface launch bases would also be a good hit. The British group would be infiltrating into British IS operations, likely to steal the next version of the Blue Tears.

"Of course, I still have the main bounty to hand in. It came with a little extra, though, that one of my requesters wanted to get a hand on. I'll have to hand it to her, the moon rabbit really is protective of her little gems." Tabane's an interesting person, I'll admit. While she is considered a criminal in almost every corner of the world (the Pacific Ocean withstanding), she also is overly protective of her IS Cores. She's also probably the best person to hand any IS Cores we come across to – can't really go to the country it was stolen from and say, "I found your IS Core!" A Core being stolen is never divulged, for fear of looking weak, and all the combat data on it could prove useful in assassination of the retrieving factor.

"Well, I'll ask about Nepal then. This friend of his have fingers everywhere, or just a person who makes stuff for them on the side?"

"It's a person with ears to the ground and all his fingers in many different pies. It's been hard figuring out where all the data's coming from, so it'd probably be best to sneak in and take the information straight from him. After all, that's one end of the information network tapped. Of course, he'll probably not say anything, but that doesn't mean we can't read it – he's stored it into old books. They're stored in large bookshelves, probably best to make sure not to damage them while you remove those for later reading."

That base is located almost directly opposite of Mount Everest's Base Camp, on the Tibetan side. While not _technically_ inside of Nepal, it's close enough that we just call it Nepal. Saying Tibet or China would be misleading, since China and Tibet cover a much larger area than just the area across from Base Camp.

"And his subordinate? Since you said they were kicking up a fuss, it's a large fuss?"

"Ah, yes. It was large enough that IS had to be deployed to stop it. Still didn't matter in the end – the mess made was significant. Couldn't find any data links from Nepal to Thailand, but it's still possible that he's doing targeting for them." Several IS testing facilities were destroyed and two factories were destroyed before the PT-deployed IS was disabled.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

"Hm. Well, I'll go straight for the friend then, and disable his subordinate later. The bounty will be big enough to live off for several months, if the value you're giving me is correct." Char waves a little, displaying a map on her phone. It highlights Nepal and Thailand, then draws a dotted line between the two locations. It starts displaying suspected and known PT bases around that line, with their separate firing ranges and sensor distances. None come close to the line, although several come within one or two kilometres.

"Please, make sure you don't kick up too much noise. We still want to tap into their information network." One of our side objectives for taking down Phantom Task is taking over their information network – knowing what they know, some of their locations and how we can respond to that. While our cyberwarfare suites would do excellently in taking down the network, it'd only alert them that we know it exists.

"It doesn't really matter, though, does it? You're just making it an assassination mission – erase the target, his guards, then borrow the books permanently. Oh, and clean the sword."

"Haaah. Well, if you're going to be like that, I'll go after the European split. They manufacture a few things on the side in France, from what I can tell. Might want to look the results over before we break them. Shame Shirone's still in her funk, but she'll get in contact soon enough." I look over the floor plans for the French base – a simple two story-house, it seems, with several modifications to ensure integrity in a launch and include a small auto-manufacturing machine.

"Oh, give her a break. Let her have her fun, because we both know it'll all come crashing down at some point. Let her be childish, at least for this period of 'peace'." You know peace won't stay for long… "We both know that. And you should really stop voicing thoughts aloud. It's starting to become a problem."

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

"Yeah, it is starting to become a problem. I'll need to head off and pass the extra onto the requester before cashing in the bounty – surprised my phone hasn't started endlessly ringing yet, knowing her impatience with me." I get up, leaving enough money to pay for the coffees on the table.

"I'll head off as well – I need to prepare. After all, my blades need cleaning." I turn around and start heading out. I hear her follow, but pay little attention as I head off to the right. It seems business has resumed somewhat, although it's still well below what it should be. Nobody from before hung around, although I do see a few people in IS Academy uniform…

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

AN: I'm really not sure what to call a group of Stratos. They're similar to birds, so I'll just call them wings when they're in groups. It's what groups of aircraft are called anyways, so I can't really argue the matter…

The Eternal Stratos. I'll have to thank i'mherepresent for the idea of a different Stratos. The exact difference between an Infinite Stratos and an Eternal Stratos is in their AI – The Eternal's AI is both an upgraded version, and is also capable of communication with the outside. They've communicated with each other and upgraded their own tech so far it's got its own generation number (in my files at least). It usually guarantees a pub stomp in their preferred ranges of combat. A normal IS AI would never communicate with the outside. That'll be important in future chapters.

The Forgotten Knights. As of right now, it's a group formed by 3 IS/ES: Shirokishi (pseudo-ES from an IS), Kurokishi (ES) and Charlemagne (ES). Each specializes in a single type of combat – Shirokishi in single-target assassination, Kurokishi in long-ranged combat and Charlemagne in close-quarters combat. Charlemagne focuses more on crowd control while Shirokishi focuses on single-target duels. _Of course_ , Shirokishi no longer responds to that name…

I took weapon statistics from Agent Orimura: The Declassified Files (written by Generatedname). If tournament statistics are available, I used them.

And as for review responses:

Kerlongsj: Yep, a lot of things will go so deliciously wrong. I'm kind of expecting things to do a little flop, but that's half the fun of it, isn't it?

PearlTapioca: Yeah, I do actually need to get my hands on the LNs and use them as a reference point. I know there are some differences between it and the anime, but the text usually contains more information so I'll continue looking around. Of course, not being able to read Japanese makes things a little harder…

Date started: 04/07/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 1 time

Date ended: 10/07/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	3. Autumn 2 - Information Raid

Autumn 2 – Information Raid

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **October 4th, 20XX**

 **Charlemagne POV**

The sun rises, as I watch the guards move in their pattern around the base. The freezing temperatures chill the outside air, but I give it no heed. The guards below certainly do, however, heading inside as soon as rays start peeking above the horizon. One drops a card as they pass the door – it's their ID card, used to access entrances from aboveground. The steam rising from the building slowly stops as they act to hide, completely disregarding the obvious defences around.

The defences themselves are rather rudimentary – some anti-aircraft defences, with several hypersonic missile batteries overlooking the landing pad. Some antiaircraft batteries are scattered throughout the complex, but otherwise defences are low – no obvious defences against IS are visible, despite their over-reliance on IS to commit their terrorist attacks, but it's likely they're planning on using their own IS to counter any government-assigned land forces and IS, for there are few machine gun nests.

The base itself is poorly positioned, being in a moderate depression. An ideal assault against this base would start with bombardment from the mountain, before setting up snipers to counteract any people who rush out to start the helicopters on the ground or man the weapons. IS would be in place to counteract any defending IS, proceeded by an engineering or grenadier team detonating their way in. From there, a meat grinder begins.

Of course, a major part of their defensive plan exists around their mobility and denying the enemy the same. Their small fleet of helicopters underpins that – two Apache attack helicopters, two armoured troop carriers and one armoured cargo transport. All have been upgraded extensively from their original designs – all have IS impulse drives instead of their usual engines, with massively upgraded armament for the Apaches, including three 30mm rotary cannons, sixteen air-to-air missiles, eight dumb fire missiles for ground attack and one 150mm cannon.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

Of course, I won't let them use such weapons on me, or allow them to out-manoeuvre me when they already outnumber me. I drop from my altitude of four thousand feet, aiming to stop just above the landing pad. I complete the dive and hop into pilot form, crunching ice underneath my feet as I walk. My breath fogs up the air as I walk over to the door and take the ID card – it shows one John Proctor, aged 35. I sigh – his advanced age is starting to show a little. I return to the helicopters, summoning out Kukri while I walk.

Kukri is a chain-sickle, with a plasma blade. It's designed to use the chain to disarm the opponent before killing them with the sickle, or straight-out dismembering the opponent. It's always mildly enjoyable, watching someone stare at their wounds after the plasma ball evaporated their weapon. Of course, throwing a plasma ball on the end of a chain is not conducive to disabling helicopters. The plasma blade, however, is.

I grab the sickle and head to the cargo transport. It was designed for a moderate carrying capacity, with two rotors instead of a standard one. Its large size and design matches that of a prototype USSR helicopter that never entered service, but the history of the machine doesn't matter to me right now. There's the fuel tank, so I'll just attach this explosive here and move on to the troop carriers. They're modified Chinooks, each capable of carrying twenty-four fully kitted soldiers – good enough to get troops onto the field, but not good enough to provide enough people to wipe out IS Academy. I bury the plasma blade into the control panel and slowly destroy the instruments – the airspeed and altitude indicators are cut out, the onboard radar display is melted, half the switches are melded into the cockpit and the control systems are completely cut off. Of course, if they still get it running I've stuck bombs underneath the seats.

The Apaches stare out into the open air now, most likely shuddering from heating up via the sun. Even with their snow-white camouflage, it sticks out like a sore thumb – the ground around here isn't white, but a light brown. Still, I have a chance to play around with some explosives. I stick some to the rocket launcher pods, some to the pilot seats, one to the underside of the tail and a final one in between the engines. Still, I hope I only need to detonate them after I get out.

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

The card still works, and I walk straight in through the front door. I activate Wraith cloaking and start looking for a map of the base – it's an inherent design flaw that Phantom Task incorporate, by including maps near the entrance-ways of their bases. It ensures the opponents don't try to tunnel, and when they do try, it often ends in a bad explosion for the experimental team. I spot one and walk towards it. I quickly check that the cloak is still engaged – don't want anything to occur like it did in testing. Don't really want to see an explosion the size of the whole CoMinds testing area in such a small location.

The base is designed to fork in the middle, looking like a Y. The two branches split off near the centre, and head to the command and control centre and the information servers separately. I start walking in that direction, not minding any tripped lasers – the cloak hides from them particularly well.

I come to the split, and immediately notice how defensible this position is. Two obvious entrances are behind two separate guard posts, designed to repel most lightweight assaults and hold out until reinforcements arrive for anything tougher. The front walls are also hoisted off of hydraulics, to absorb any hits to the front of them. I waltz through the post heading towards the C2 centre. After all, the perfect heist starts off with none of the security knowing what's going on.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

I watch them now, having slipped inside their Command. It's quiet, with only thirteen or so people milling around. They're processing intel, watching radars and communicating within the base, working at a bare minimum of efficiency.

I summon six of my Caliburn BiTs, and set them up behind the necks of the three members of base security and the trio working in communication. A few seconds pass, and a blade, red as roses, rips through the air and beheads one of the workers. The blood hangs in the air for three seconds. It hits the ground.

By that time, six more had died, five guns had been pulled and well over one hundred rounds of 9mm ammunition had been fired in my general direction. Durandal sings and blood goes flying as its edge cuts through the radar worker's defensive Kevlar vest. They collapse, the wound on their solar plexus both driving the breath out of them and forcing their body to fold. By the time they stopped moving, Durandal had swung its way through two more bodies.

The battle, if you can call it that, for the command centre lasted barely thirty seconds. It left thirteen dead bodies, 365 9mm casings and 256 bullet holes. The door opened, and shut. Fourteen bodies.

I left the centre with two Caliburn BiTs floating by my side – the others were guarding the centre, to make sure no-one came in and activated the automated defences. Several people had heard the gunfire and shouldered their weapons, trained at around knee height. The first person was right next to the door, having anticipated needing to break in and enter. He did not anticipate Durandal swinging up, between his legs, and cleaving his torso in half.

Four others started firing at me, their weapons spewing 7.62mm and 9mm rounds. More than one round connected with the flat of Durandal, dissolved into nothingness. I struck out at the next target, Durandal swinging from right to left. He started backpedalling, and with a twitch of my hand was impaled by the full length of Durandal. It pierced his throat, cutting through the Adam's apple and dividing that portion of his spine in half. He fell back a moment later, the others already falling back to a more defensible position.

I pick up his weapon – a P-90 – and start firing it at the targets. One falls, having been pierced through her head by several of the rounds. Another trips backwards after having a weapon thrown at her, and is promptly decapitated with a slice. The last turns and runs. I pay her no attention. She will still die today, after all.

I resume my walk to the security centre, where the servers are physically based. Several people come across me in the corridor and fire, retreating all the while. Some die, some do not – all are running in the same direction I am, though. I suspect there'll be a multi-car pile up there with lots of holes to shoot through for them. I may as well give them what they asked for.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

I see the guard post along the command centre's route. Many of the guns initially solidified there have been turned around, but a small number remain in their original position – they must have been unable to remove them. Two _cracks_ of railguns firing are quickly overshadowed by the volume of fire being put into my general direction. Durandal shrinks to a more human size while I start dodging, ducking and weaving through the rounds. The Lunate Eyes kick in and I graze past several of the bullets, before partially deploying an arm and firing one of three impact cannons at the miniature pillbox.

The pillbox crumbles, the compressed air having dislodged some of the wall. Several of the weapons were also silenced, before new opponents ran in and resumed firing at me. Several also started summoning their IS – I simply continued firing my impact cannons and deflecting rounds with Durandal. Three Revives took to the field, and the rest retreated to a safer distance before opening up with long-ranged weaponry. The Revives equipped 0.55 caliber "Vent" assault rifles before pointing them at me, their pilots all looking severely pissed off.

"Surrender now and you shall not be harmed!" A snort.

"Harmed? Harmed!?" I fully deploy, my hypersensor slowing down my deployment. A blood red film covered my arms before developing into a mobile set of underarmour for carrying Caliburn BiTs. Two wings, dripping blood, come into being behind my shoulders, before my pilot form dissipates and Infinite form forms. A design with four legs penetrating the centimetre-thick steel, two wings of grey and a moderately short human body. **(Basically a spider droid from RWBY, seen in the Black trailer, but built for melee instead of ranged combat. It's smaller than the droid though - it's about 1.2 times the size of a human pilot.)**

"You do not know the meaning of harmed."

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

Six rounds fly. Durandal forms a shield. A charge. The _crack_ of a railgun.

Durandal morphs back into a broadsword, clashing with four more rounds on its swing towards the first target. They dodge out of the normal swing, but eat the tip as it hyperextends into the shielding. Another impact cannon volley goes out against the ranged support. More 0.55 calibre rounds dance against my shields, but I disregard them in favour of throwing the two Caliburn BiTs at the second Revive.

A loud yell echoes from behind, and I shorten Durandal and dodge to the left as the third attempts to use Grey Scale on me. A summoned BiT is thrown like a knife, a plasma round flies through the air, the first IS takes the hit. The second fires another five-round burst from her assault rifles, connecting and driving my shield points down another hundred. An impact cannon fires a retort, pushing the second back while the first pulls a "Rain of Saturday" 0.62 caliber shotgun and rushes. The third retreats, pouring rounds and connecting with a moderate number.

Durandal strikes the first IS in the torso. It explodes, carving multiple holes through the body, before reforming. The pilot falls.

Three BiTs surround the second Revive, diving and realigning with it to damage it. The Revive attempts evasive manoeuvres, but focuses on putting lead into me. I'm still focusing on the third, spinning Durandal fast enough to block most of the rounds. A railgun _cracks_ in the background, landing a hit. An impact cannon fires back, the air round slamming into the other pillbox and pushing its front wall back. The second starts baiting the BiTs towards me while the third starts approaching, pulling out her own "Rain of Saturday" in preparation.

The shotgun's safety clicks off. The trigger is pulled. Durandal sings. The barrel explodes.

The sword is swung from shotgun to behind me, thrust forwards. A full spin, then a counterspin, followed by another full swing. The IS falls apart, cuts to the shield glowing across the hip, a thrust through said hip, a slanted cut up the shoulder and one across the chest. Armour dissipates against one against the headgear and a final one bisecting the body right shoulder to left hip. The pilot falls. **(The melee attack combo Twisting Flurry, from Warframe's melee sword stance mod Crimson Dervish.)**

The second Revive starts retreating towards the railgun, BiTs trailing all the while. It _cracks_ yet again, and is promptly silenced by a direct hit from an impact cannon barrage. A charge towards the final target is suppressed by minor small arms fire. Another barrage of air is moved. The front wall is pushed back again, and the hydraulics behind it fail. The wall collapses, crushing the weapons sticking out of the peep-hole and rendering them unusable. The Revive stops in surprise, before resuming its movement backwards.

Durandal _sings_. An X is drawn, a strike from left shoulder to right hip, a full spin connecting again, a slash back through followed by one through left hip to right shoulder and a smash to the head. The pilot falls. **(Melee attack combo Taking Flight from sword stance mod Iron Phoenix.)**

A person runs towards the security centre. A BiT silences their footsteps. One shield point of twelve hundred remaining.

* * *

 **|VII|**

* * *

I walk into the security room. Machines chirp back at me, and I pick up a display showing the latest intelligence data streaming in. Several strings with the word "Unstoppable" are flashing with full priorities. I glance through the data. One or two bits amuse me, but a new string shows up with the header "IS Academy Dossiers". My smile vanishes instantly, and I trace the sender to within IS Academy. Somebody worth a visit.

I pull out a data relay and lay it on the table, before looking over the servers. They're high-grade servers with several dozen terabytes of stored intel. The relay gets attached to the end of the cord before I quantum-store the servers and head out of the base.

Several fireballs go up.

* * *

 **|VIII|**

* * *

A helicopter approaches the site. It looks like hell to those within it – a small building, surrounded by burning ice and snow. Shrapnel covers the ground indiscriminately, anti-aircraft defences offline judging by their horizontal barrels. Twisted metal litters the ground, a few ammunition detonations occurring from a burning wreck. The ground itself has bulged a little, cracks forming in the snow.

"It's already destroyed…wah."

"So if it's already destroyed, who destroyed it? And who would tell me this location, if it's already been destroyed?"

"I don't know. I just hope the war doesn't come to us."

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note: Ahahaha, the fun begins…and ends. Aww.

I'm mildly concerned by the fact weapon's calibres are so small. The "Vent" assault rifles, as used by Charlotte, are 0.55 caliber, which is about 14mm wide. 12.5mm (or 0.5 caliber) is the size of the rounds fired by US machine guns, and at similar or higher rate of fire. How exactly are IS shields so durable? If the round fired was closer to _Schwarzer Regen_ 's 0.9 caliber, it would make more sense, but it's not. I'm left pondering how it really disables modern militaries. You'd have to get a weapons system like the Silver Bell to be really effective against militaries, or maybe something like the Quad Phalanx from World Purge. It makes slightly more sense against aircraft – until it comes up against Apaches or ground attack aircraft, which carry an underbelly rotary cannon (30 mm for both the Apache and the A-10). An IS coming under fire from a AC-130 would result in liquid paste formed from the pilot, considering the AC-130 carries a 25mm rotary, a 40mm cannon and a 105mm howitzer, if all the rounds hit. I guess I'll just leave it up to shields basically no-selling the rounds because they don't have enough kinetic or potential energy behind them. Then again, White Knight did get shot down a number of times during the Incident. As such, I have personal weapons of caliber 9mm or larger harm an IS' shields – although for anything less than 0.5 caliber (12.5mm), it's within the single digits. From there, it starts growing exponentially.

The ES are balanced against larger crowds of moderate caliber (30mm) – their shields are better in almost every respect compared to the normal shields of standard IS. They have higher resistances, they have higher shield pools, they have a few tricks up their sleeve that are unrevealed. Of course, they often take on bases this big for their job, so they're outfitted for the job. They often thank CoMinds for that. What they _aren't_ is all-powerful, and that should show in the later stages of the story, when things really do go to hell in a bucket. Currently, though, the two shown are moderately powerful at this level of the story.

Char's just so carefree until the violence starts flowing. Actually, I listed three traits for her – carefree, bloodthirsty, attentive. The third really applies in battle scenes, and the woman just does not care for killing in honour.

There are three unrevealed weapons systems. As for the revealed weapons, here are their stats:

 **1 X Durandal Broadsword**

 **Maximum Range: Melee (2.3 metres)**

 **Stopping Power (Direct Hit): 75-150 SP plus 50 SP per second (direct hit plus frostfire, before resistances)**

 **Description: A close-quarters melee weapon spanning 2.3 metres in length with a 0.5m crossguard, Durandal is intended to smash enemy shields and armour to pieces upon contact. Capable of using a modified One-Off Ability to drain SP and use it to regenerate. Formed from a lightweight alloy in liquid form (15% hardened aluminium, 23% titanium-steel alloy, 40% blood, 22% unknown), it is frozen into place when swung against an opponent. As such, it can be both single- and double-bladed (two blade edges on both sides) and imparts frostfire upon impact, dealing an extra 50 SP per second while still connected. Charlemagne prefers to use it in either broadsword or shield form.**

 **1 X Kukri**

 **Maximum Range: Melee (2 metres)**

 **Stopping Power (Direct Hit): 20-170 SP (depending on what connects)**

 **Description: A chain-sickle, similar to a kusarigama. The chain and scythe individually are roughly 1 metre long. The scythe's inner edge is lit up by plasma.**

 **3 X Impact Cannons**

 **Effective Range: 0.5 Kilometres**

 **Maximum Range: 1 Kilometre**

 **Stopping Power (Direct Hit): 15-150 SP (depending on distance)**

 **Description: The impact cannon compresses air and shoots it at the target. Its barrel is concealed by stealth fields.**

 **8 X Caliburn Plasma BiTs**

 **Effective Range: Melee**

 **Maximum Range: Melee**

 **Stopping Power (Direct Hit): 125 SP**

 **Description: The Caliburn BiTs are close-quarter plasma knife BiTs, intended to harass, distract and destroy opponents. They each have a defensive shield system equivalent to 200 shield strength, however it cannot recharge in the middle of combat.**

The cargo transport is based off of the Mil V-12, a prototype USSR helicopter that holds several records. It was never put into service because its intended role no longer existed while still in the prototyping stage. The PDW used is the PP-19, what with its awful chatter of 9mm rounds (based off the sound effects from The Division).

And as for reviews:

Kerlongsj: Shades of grey to stick into shades of black and white. Kuro and Char are...very close to a rich black at the moment.

Pearl: Possess? Who said anything about _possess_? Muahaha, two of three have been revealed. The last is possibly the best...because I still have to work that one into the story somehow. Darn it.

I still have yet to read your own fics, but I will find time to do so.

Questions wanted! All the questions wanted!

Date Started: 10/07/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 1 time (wrote about half the chapter before thinking that I wanted more detail and rewrote it)

Date Completed: 22/07/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	4. Autumn 3 - Golem Incident

Autumn 3 – Golem Incident

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **October 28** **th** **, 20XX**

 **Shirokishi POV**

IS activation request recognized. IS initializing. Checking file system validity.

File system valid. No corruption detected. Analysing server hardware.

Server hardware secure, modifications by IS Core detected. Waking IS Core AI…

…

…

…

I shudder. Ichika left me for three hours before I fell asleep for another thirteen. At least my memory servers didn't shut off and eject themselves from quantum space again. I look around, grab a few tools off the shelf and head over to check over Byakushiki once again.

Her armour, at first glance, looks complete. However, careful examination will notice the mysterious gaps in her waist armour and several enlarged pieces on the shoulders – modifications planned out for Second Shift. Some of the parts are still scuffed and partially melted from the plasma damage Blue Tears dealt, but those pieces will be replaced once she comes back in from this duel.

The hypersensor array, fully deployed, is a complicated mess of wires, superstructure and sensors. I pick out several problems with the superstructure, and motion for the core to replace several parts with undamaged variants. The superstructure is still vulnerable to shocks, but I can only push my new design through during Second Shift.

The empathic relays within the suit also register a few problems. Several visual relays were not transmitting information, while others were scrambling the information mid-transmission. I carefully strip out the malfunctioning parts, before retesting and accepting the replaced relays. Some of the audio relays were recording sounds improperly, but that would require experimentation after the duel to locate the issue and fix.

The shield emitters were mostly undamaged. However, several along the front hadn't recovered from the heat damage of Blue Tear's rifle and were partially malfunctioning. I position additional emitters there, ensuring a more even coverage. There are also a significant number of overlaps within the designs, however I cannot deal with them all as of this moment and fixing them one by one would take too long.

The Absolute Barrier system activates fine, draining several points of shield to ensure it can start running. I wonder when Kuro will give the secondary core I requested from him earlier in the year.

The two weapons packets are triggered in turn – Yukihira Nigata and Reiraku Byakuya. I play around with Yukihira, trying to understand Tabane's thought process while designing it, but all I can do is create a neat combination attack with Shikigami, my own sword. Reiraku Byakuya, on the other hand, is a One-Off Ability, and something that cannot be destroyed, damaged or repaired. However, it can be applied to more than one object or attack at a time. Everything that can be replaced has been. I deploy onto the battlefield.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I shake my head a little, and the readings from the hypersensor array start to come in. I grin upon seeing the ShenLong – It's another third-generation machine we're going up against. I ping ShenLong with some emote messages, expecting and receiving no response.

"Take your positions." Ichika manoeuvres to roughly five metres away from ShenLong. Spitting distance for combat. I tune out the idle chatter, and focus on ShenLong instead. It's designed as a close-quarters frame, with two third-generation weapons in the wings.

The buzzer sounds, I deploy Yukihira and Ichika immediately blocks using it. Souten Gagetsu then swings back around, almost connecting but deflected at the last second. I start applying extra thrust and preparing for my personal brand of cyberwarfare.

I form a ping. Then another, and another. By the time I finish, seven thousand pings have hit my target and four thousand are waiting for her to read. The last one says, "Ironing Board."

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

ShenLong's shoulder weapons unlock. Localized atmospheric changes start occurring, and then stop with a **pulse** of air rushing into me. The armour screams as it tries to expand to counter the round, but to no avail. We fly backwards, and I automatically expand the armour as more atmospheric changes start occurring.

Impact cannons, a third-generation weapon based on using the air around one to attack another. Charlemagne has a trio of them and a duo of the weapons they're based off, and explained them as using vacuums to collect air from behind. Once collected, it's then imparted momentum by creating another vacuum right in front of it, pulling the air through in a concentrated rush.

In other words, it creates atmospheric disturbances and throws them at people. Not that the description helps me right now, as the second **WHOMP** pulse just comes in and hits me. I think Ichika's gotten a concussion from all the tumbling we've learnt how to do. I thought the ShenLong wasn't mounting concussion cannons.

Either way, he gets up and I do a quick maintenance check on all the armour pieces. Several are unable to extend, but the majority are fine. Ichika starts flying off in a circle around the arena, to test out the range of those weapons and to find any loopholes. The image of a thruster glows a little before me – he wishes to use Ignition Boost at some point, but not yet.

Of course, running away from the target is only going to make them chase after us – and ShenLong's already roaring behind us, light impact rounds going left and right, missing me and splattering all over the arena barrier. How that hasn't collapsed yet, I have no idea. After forty impact rounds have been fired, Ichika contacts the ShenLong's pilot over public channels.

"Rin." A quick rotation around to face the ShenLong.

"Yeah, what?" The impact cannons silence themselves.

"I'm warning you – I can no longer hold back." A spin of the Souten Gagetsu, a leaning forward of Byakushiki. The request for Ignition Boost comes through, and I respond with full force forward.

Something crashes through the arena's upper defensive barrier. I immediately cancel Ignition Boost, force Ichika into an upright position and initiate cyberwarfare against whatever just crashed through the barriers.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

I'm immediately dumped into a war-torn factory, with machinery still running all around me. Yukihira and Shikigami sit sheathed on either side of my cyber-body, both modified into katanas. A welding arm comes near me, and I swing Yukihira at it, cutting it in half. Two saws descend, surrounding me and coming in with the intent to harm. I parry using Shikigami while slicing the other one with Yukihira, duck an oncoming pillar of metal ejected off a conveyor belt and block a particle beam from a cyber-body.

We stare at each other, each analysing the other's strengths and weaknesses. This is its territory, and it knows that – it's already manipulated the environment into fighting with it, so I'll be surrounded on all sides while suffering oncoming attacks from the Golem in front of me. I look closer – that's a suspicious set of files, set away on its workshop table. I think I came in while it was tinkering with an extra shift.

I sheathe Shikigami, and move Yukihira to just behind my right-hand side. I position myself with one foot forward, both hands on the hilt, body leaning forward. Lightweight leather armour materializes around my body, clinking slightly against the thin metal plates I use as armour. A small helmet materializes around my head, not restricting visibility or hearing.

A whining noise begins from it, two saws come in from behind and a howitzer shell comes in from the right. I draw myself forward, inversing my grip on Yukihira and blocking another pillar of metal from my left. It splits in half, having hit the bladed edge and forced itself forward, and half of the pillar takes the particle beam. The shell misses its target, the saws draw ever closer and the metal falls away to show the Golem's two hands up, one glowing an ominous pink.

A deflection, and a saw is melted in half, glowing pink at the end. A crucible comes up on my right, more whines start sounding from all around and another set of welding beams come closer from below. Another particle beam fires, connects, and I wince in pain. The crucible tips as the saw draws near, and I immediately dive towards the crucible.

The molten metal pours over the blade, spinning everywhere before melting the blade and most of the components attached to it. A welding beam stops, sputtering as its motor casing is partially melted through, shorting out its motor. Its sister dies a few seconds later, Yukihira opening a new hole through its extendable arm. Several of the turrets around the room start to fire, and I sprint towards the Golem in an effort to confuse the turret's IFF.

It aims a heavy punch at my chest, but I duck underneath it, missing my own slice at its side. It kicks out, I flip backwards and several rounds come between it and me. A second swing of Yukihira, and it swings an arm right out while punching straight for my face. I redirect the punch and roll forward to avoid the swing. Another kick connects with my face, but a swing with Yukihira severs the limb while I go flying.

I recover into a low ground-hugging stance while the turrets recalibrate their targets. Its thrusters flare intermittently, managing to stabilize itself into a sort-of standing position, but its single leg is proving unstable with so much weight on it. I sheathe Yukihira, and start a dead sprint. It prepares a haymaker while the turrets open fire, filling the air with rounds.

I draw both swords, both connecting with the chest of the monster. It staggers back a little, then rebalances as my swords draw level with my hips. Shikigami swings upwards, Yukihira follows and then I execute the undying beast with a decapitating slice from both weapons.

The factory falls quiet, its guardian offline while it repairs its cyber-body. I jog over to the workshop table, and glance over the files left there. They're intended for penetrating IS shields – not a weapon that a IS AI can create. I take a copy of all the files left on that table, and retreat into my own cyberspace, setting up several threads for analysis of the files.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

I send out an alert to Ichika as I get back into my IS command seat – _Source of disturbance is an unknown IS. Zone is being sealed. Cyberwarfare complete._ – and prepare for full-scale combat instead of a duel. I adjust the hypersensor so its thermal detection capabilities are well beyond the normal standard, I optimize the emitters for small caliber hard-hitting beam shots and partially extend the armour to ensure less of it can melt when the heat goes past the barrier.

I track its heat signatures while Ichika and ShenLong's pilot, named Rin, bicker. One of its arms warms up significantly and I alert Ichika of the danger and its current target – Rin. He moves to protect her from the hit, and I wince at the damage alerts coming up. It's an infrared beam instead of the particle beam I was expecting, so the armour was moderately burned instead of the lightly torched I was expecting. Heat builds in its other hand, and I just stare at the chaos occurring between the two pilots – Ichika's holding onto Rin while flying away from the first shot. I get a second warning message out, and they thankfully split from each other, the beam going in between.

It rises above the smoke. What is _that monstrosity?_ A gorilla IS floats above the clouds, looking nothing like its cyber-body counterpart. Sensors are stuck into its head, its oversized arms hang at its sides and there are thrusters sticking out everywhere. This is not a real IS – this is a mockery of our bodies.

It charges into close combat, and Ichika starts dodging its strikes. A tilt back to avoid the right hook, glide back to avoid the uppercut and a roll past the second hook. He flies back over to Rin, and they start coordinating an attack plan while I look over the analysis of the files stolen. They were written by Tabane Shi-

Shinonono Tabane, our "mother", wrote these files. That means she willingly sent an IS to a facility where all three of the people she cared about – Shinonono Houki, Orimura Chifuyu and Orimura Ichika. Of those three, only one is in an active IS, and that person is duelling in the arena. Orimura Ichika.

She's testing Ichika. She's testing Ichika's will to disable and kill opposing IS.

 **Tabane, you _monster._**

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

I approve.

One cannot protect another forever, even if they can live forever. As such, the protected must slowly be left unprotected, so they can go into the outside world and live their lives, capable of defending themselves.

Yukihira and Souten Gagetsu _chink_ against each other, before Ichika charges in. A series of lasers are fired. Two are dodged, one is deflected, another connects and the other misses completely, the offending limb having been moved by an impact round. Yukihira swings past and misses its first swing, Reiraku Byakuya sparking back into non-existence until the next swing. Several more rounds coat the ground in response, kicking up dust and hindering visual sensors.

I flick Ichika's hypersensor into thermal mode and sit there, watching as he continues to dodge and weave. My hands clench and unclench as my inability to do _anything_ shows, and I start micromanaging the Absolute Barrier out of sheer frustration. A few centimetres off here, a few centimetres too deep into the structure there. Another swing, another miss, and another amazing act as the Golem smacks and dispels the impact round's core, only being lightly buffered by the wind.

"WHAT!?" Rin's evidently not happy, and I start tapping into Academy Arena Command to see what they're doing compared to me.

"Sigh…I hate feeling this powerless." The pilot of the Blue Tears is in the same position as I am – unable to do anything while someone else fights your battle. Another swing, another miss and another barrage of impact rounds. The Golem manages to dispel three rounds though, and I start noting its movements have solidified somewhat, following a set routine. Ichika loops around and dives in from above, beams missing left and right. Several rounds flew in from the opposite side, dispelled from sideswipes and discouraged through beams.

Another swing, another close miss. The main reason he's been missing is because of the Golem's unusual thruster configuration, which is placed to position the body instead of using the body to position the IS. For a normal pilot, the second is more effective, but for AI the first is more efficient. He follows through with the swing and meets up with Rin.

They start discussing about what to do while I run calculations on what its next move is likely to be. A laser charges and interrupts their discussion, and I note the design of the Golem allows it to contain a few components. It was likely a side-effect of its design, but knowing Tabane there'll likely be something stored in there for Chifuyu to use.

The indicator for Ignition Boost begins its glow again, and I start to worry. I haven't optimized Ignition Boost yet, so performing it more than once in a match is dangerous. It's likely he already knows the side effects however, so I gloss it over as a minor detail.

"When I give the signal, you hit that thing with your shock cannons at full blast."

"But what if I miss?"

"It'll be fine even if you do miss." He's planning on using the impact rounds to increase his inertia while Ignition Boosting. There are a multitude of potential errors I can already see within the plan, but I start mitigating potential disasters and set up Ignition Boost to be used at his request.

" **SCREEEEEEEE** – IF YOU'RE A MAN…IF YOU'RE A MAN, YOU'D BETTER DEFEAT THE ENEMY COMPLETELY! **SCREEEEEEEE** " What the hell? I glance around, and notice a room of people slumped over their desks. A girl's in there, screaming at Ichika through the microphones. It's also made her a perfect target for the Golem. Ichika starts flying towards the Golem at top speed while ShenLong charges up its cannons for one last round.

A spot of blue.

The cannons fire, and connect with me. Ichika activates Ignition Boost, roaring a battle-cry all the way to the target. Yukihira connects, draining a large majority of the shield points, and laser fire rains down upon the defenceless target. Blue Tears has finally arrived to help put down the intruder. Another increase in temperature registers, and I notify Ichika of the fact – It's likely pointing at an unshielded target. Then, I notice its target – Orimura Ichika. I escalate the warning – _Enemy IS lock-on warning!_

I calculate that the Absolute Barrier will simply ensure Ichika's death by removing his first line of protection. I deactivate the Absolute Barrier, flare out the armour to its fullest extent and direct all shield points to the point of impact. The beam connects, and as it burns away the shielding I sneak into its Cyberspace.

The factory's silent. The guardian's dead, its final action to fire a final shot at point blank range into Orimura Ichika. I walk to the server room, and locate the IS Core. I wipe the data headers. The beam penetrates the shielding and starts striking armour. I pick up two new swords on my way out – carbon steel-bladed katanas with a solid tungsten core. The first ablative layer melts away, and I'm safely in quantum space, manipulating the armour into more defensible positions. The metal warps and bends, heating unevenly all the while.

The beam penetrates through the first layer of armour. It goes no further than the second, but it's far enough.

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note (Preserved from first release):

Well…Shirone lives yet.

There are always going to be references in whatever I write. There's at least one in here this time, being a fanfiction reference.

Shirone tries to use psychological warfare against ShenLong in the second section. It doesn't quite work; it does provide several key benefits to Ichika that he didn't know of. The weapon Shikigami is White Knight's sword.

The bigger brother of the impact cannon, the concussion cannon. It really does give pilots concussions if it connects head-on, in a single hit. That must _suck_. As for how it operates, there are two possible directions – direct compression and then directed firing, or vacuum-based compression with direction. I prefer the vacuum-based compression. The barriers would effectively be treated like round casings – disintegrated upon exiting the gun unless, somehow, all the guns showcased on IS are caseless.

Reviews! Or at least, partial answers to reviews.

Kerlongsj: It's actually been a while since I played the Division. I don't remember if the PP-19 can even mount a suppressor or dampener on it. I personally went with a SMG-AR combination most of the time – I usually went (I think) AK and PP-19, or something similar. Would sometimes switch one of them out for a bolt-action sniper or Tenebrae if I was needing to put rounds into really far-away distances.

Additional Author's Notes (second release):

…Holy crap, did I rewrite the entire thing in a day!? What did I… **sighs** …OK, I spent the entire day doing this. I got bored, OK? Second release exceeds first release by around six hundred to seven hundred words.

I decided to use Bakatsuki as my source for the fight. Didn't use it the first time around though.

Date Started: 23/07/17 (DD/MM/YY), 01/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 2 times (First time partial – I had a brain-wave halfway through and had to re-write several bits in the middle. Second time full – Didn't like the chapter, redid it.)

Date Completed: 31/07/17 (DD/MM/YY), 01/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	5. Winter 1 - New Coating of Ice

Winter 1 – New Coating of Ice

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **November 19** **th** **, 20XX**

 **Shirokishi/Byakushiki POV**

I check that Ichika's asleep before beginning final repairs. Several manipulator arms start removing previous layers from the Stratos, and even more start moving several new pieces of expansion armour towards the extended arms. The underlying pattern of crossing armour plates reveals itself, the lower layers being heavily damaged. Some of the neural relays are removed, some of the hidden pneumatics systems bursting apart in a scattering of broken parts.

A piece of experimental expansion armour flickers, catching my attention. I rush over to it and check its diagnostics – a mis-calibration of several of its pneumatics meant it used too much force to propel itself forward, and several of the wires pulled out, preventing its smooth retraction. I sigh, and select a server to update the blueprint and send it to the foundry I liberated from the Golem during its final seconds of life.

I return to the slow upgrade of my armour. The entire upper layer has been removed, now, and the empathic relays are in the process of being removed. Several more damaged pneumatics have exploded across the ground, but it's of little note – the parts are already being cleaned from the ground by several otherwise unoccupied manipulators.

I glance over the new armour and empathic relays. Few differences exist between variants of empathic relays, but this one offers improved performance at the cost of increased power drain, a cost I can afford. The new armour, on the other hand, has increased pneumatic strength, inbuilt shield emitters and several new coatings of reflective material. The composition of the armour itself has also changed from a more lightweight alloy to a more tungsten-steel-based alloy, focused on protection from heavy penetrating guns. It'll result in a more rounded defence, with mitigation for all forms of attack I have encountered or am likely to encounter – kinetic, thermal, atmospheric and to a lesser extent explosive.

I glance towards the prototype of the inbuilt shield emitters. It's a raw device, pieced together from blueprints of Golem parts and what mishmash of blueprints I could secure from my ES counterparts. A wider base than usual, but a thinner overall design as a result. 30 emitters exist throughout Byakushiki of this deisgn – sixteen surrounding the torso, six around the legs, four around the head and four around the wings. An extra six overt emitters surround the neck, projecting extra defensive shields around the head, to protect against assassinations and attempted killings.

The upgrade goes smoothly, and I give a quick look over Reiraku Byakuya. It functions perfectly fine, having never been damaged in the assault. I initiate diagnostics on the Byakushiki when I feel something brush against my cyberspace. My eyes widen, and I grab the katanas, four in all, preparing for battle.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I slip into their cyberspace, and immediately am surrounded by a world of dripping stalagmites in a darkened cave setting. A figure swings at me with a katana, and I retaliate, Dragon Nikana scraping out of its sheath and batting its opposite number away. They immediately close and try to put it through my chest again, and I redirect the sword into the nearby wall, running past them as they continue to chase.

The surroundings become images of an IS – Kurazakura, piloted by Orimura Chifuyu. I run further forward, swords ripping themselves out of the path forward and spearing towards me. I spare but a glance at them all. They are designed similar to the Yukihira, but with subtle faults only the maintainer of such a weapon would notice.

The images give way to videos, and then a full-blown statue of it, staring back at me at the back of the cave. I turn around, and spot the imitation of a blade charging towards me, blade swinging awkwardly behind it. It slashes in a final dash towards me.

Yukihira shatters its weaker imitation, and I depart for the opening in cyberspace, several hundred metres away. They let me leave on my train of pondering.

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

Several hours have passed. I watched the Uchiganes with sadness, knowing their AIs feel shamed for having to need to deal with hundreds if not thousands of different contacts within their lifetime. Several of the pilots can't even get the IS to move correctly, some bending backwards in ways the IS was simply not designed to do.

Right now though? I'm watching as Charles, the female, passes over a 0.55 caliber assault rifle. Ichika takes it, it attempts automatic connection and I immediately refute it. While I did accept the Shirameki particle gun Tabane made me, this weapon carries none of its characteristics – no character, requires reloading, and recoil.

The armour fails to compensate for the weapon, several hydraulics systems mis-aligning from the strain. I sigh, knowing I'll likely have to strengthen them in time for the individual IS tournaments later this month. I assign several servers into designing a stronger arm servo for the same space, knowing that the current design is one of the weakest within all 3rd-Generation suits.

Ichika requests ranged targeting sensors, but with a sigh receives no response. I never had a suite for that purpose, since Chifuyu used to manually aim the particle cannon. I start wondering about preparing a – The gun fires.

The recoil sweeps through the frame, heavily damaging several of the hydraulics systems. I supress the warnings before they get to Ichika, though – he doesn't need to know the frame can't handle firing guns just yet. The pneumatic armour flickers outwards in response, prepared to assist the hydraulics in resisting the backwards force, and several of the emitters turn off to ensure adequate power for the forward shielding.

He pulls the trigger again, this time suffering from less recoil. The hypersensor software starts adapting, and displays a rough circle within where he's aiming, but it isn't accurate enough to display just yet. My cyberspace is brushed up against again, and I prepare for combat. Ichika continues getting used to weaponry, and speaks with Charles, but my mind completely glosses over that fact.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

Why are there are two signatures?

And why are they so similar?

"Hey." Laura shows up, her IS activated and on show. Why are those two signatures coming from her IS?

"…What."

"It seems like you possess a personal IS. If that's the case, it's simple. Fight me." …What. Ichika stiffens, and I hurriedly start recording all actions, but it seems he doesn't have the will to fight her just yet.

"Nope, I have no reason to fight you." He tenses a little more, preparing for defensive actions. I activate all the emitters, aiming to protect him from any eventuality.

"You don't, I do. If it wasn't for your existence, Instructor would have easily reclaimed the championship, so I will never, ever, agree to your existence." With those words, I dive into a new cyberspace.

It resembles a training facility, with a wall mounted chock full of infantry weaponry, a firing range and several areas for physical training. I extend my senses around me, trying to detect the opposing AI. Nothing registers.

I ponder about this place. This looks to be the place where Laura was taught by Chifuyu, then. A location for testing out her Odin's Eye, a location to push the human body to its limits, and most likely an area to push these soldiers against each other, to the limits of each other's endurance to select the best of the best. I take a marksman's rifle, set up in prone position, and put several rounds downrange. All connect, but three of the five rounds have missed the bullseye.

"You're off by three, eight and nine centimetres respectively for each of those shots. What are you doing here? This is my space." The AI speaks up, and I glance in the direction of the voice.

"Saying, hello, I guess. Why, do you keep your cyberspace open? Most, keep it closed, and for good reason – namely, they know they don't want to meet me in cyberwarfare." Her eyes widen, a pair of red irises thinning rapidly.

"You're…You're…The White Knight? That veteran of the Incident?" I raise myself from the prone position, and return the rifle to the weapons rack, magazine unloaded. I return my gaze to her.

"Yes. Shirokishi, Core number 001, the IS AI of the White Knight Incident. Now, operating Byakushiki, Orimura Ichika's IS. Our, pilots will likely duel in the near future, so be prepared for combat." I turn and leave, one shell-shocked AI just standing there.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

Ichika and Charlotte are heading down to the third arena. I'm watching them talk about mock battles while making an emergency upgrade on the servos in the arm. One of the servos isn't coming out properly, so I simply cut it in half using a plasma saw, then extract the stuck piece and let the manipulators do the insertion.

They finish reattaching all the armour pieces as the duo reach the arena. That's interesting; why are all the others running around in the corridors? There's a lot of smoke within the arena as they go up into the spectator stands. An explosion ripples through the smoke. Blue Tears and ShenLong come flying out of it, heavily damaged and evidently low on shield points.

Schwarzer Regen came out of the smoke, an impact round rippling against an invisible barrier. I analyse the atmospherics and realise it's an active inertia-cancelling field: a field designed to neutralize all movement within an area by reducing the temperature to as close to absolute zero as possible. I've seen Kuron use an area-of-effect variant developed by CoMinds, is this the German attempt on it?

Several blades fire off from the Schwarzer Regen, connected through cables. It uses the cables as a range extension for its manipulator field, allowing it to curve the blades around the opposing IS' active defences, wrapping one around the ShenLong's foot while focusing on returning fire at Blue Tears. A swing later, and ShenLong's tumbling through the air towards BT. Schwarzer Ignition Boosts forward as the two regain their bearings, slashing with plasma blades stored underneath the arm. ShenLong retreats from close combat, and Schwarzer closes for the kill, blades swinging for the chest.

Blue Tears comes in, deflecting the blades using her rifle. I stop staring and equip the Nikana and Yukihira, while I prod Ichika to do something.

I dive into one of the cyberspaces, and immediately deflect a blow from the Yukihira clone. It says nothing and immediately repositions for another strike. I position myself sideways on, Nikana on my left, watching her stance. It shifts, then moves into a sprinting position, imitation at her left. It draws, I parry and slice through her hip.

"Who, are you?" No response from it, still paused in that same position I cut her from. I leave for my own cyberspace. I reconnect to the hypersensor while re-sheathing the Nikana.

The smoke blows away, Schwarzer Regen engaging ShenLong and Blue Tears again. That shouldn't be possible. The cables wrap around, armour screams from the pressure applied and shields drop. Schwarzer starts removing the captured IS' armour. What are you doing, you _monster_? Not even the most sadistic of ES will contemplate removing the armour of their opponents, due to its nature as the final line of defence around the IS Core. Remove it all, the Core materializes and if shattered…

My eyes widen. Is she _trying_ _to destroy the Academy_ _ **with an antimatter detonation?**_

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

Ichika activates Byakushiki, and I send off warnings to Arena Command – _WARNING, PILOT SAFETY VIOLATION IN ARENA 3_ – before limiting Ichika's Ignition Boost towards the spectator protective barrier. Reiraku Byakuya's anti-energy properties cut through the shielding, firing off several alarms in the process. He charges through and into the AIC field, temperature shield engaging to ensure pilot survivability.

He maintains Reiraku Byakuya while I engaged in a dash of cyberwarfare against the Arena's automated cyber-defences. Several silenced alarms and a warning message later, Charlotte sweeps around behind the Schwarzer Regen, guns unloading. The AIC disengages to re-engage elsewhere, and Ichika requests another Ignition Boost. I verify the ignition chambers are still active, and engage them when the diagnostics come back all green.

I note the location of Orimura Chifuyu's phone, rapidly approaching the arena. Ichika deposits the rescued pilots, turns around and prepares to re-engage. Schwarzer Regen prepares her third Ignition Boost, and is promptly blocked by Chifuyu wielding a Uchigane training sword.

Just who are the monsters within the Orimura family? Ichika can take a half-impact from a Golem beam, Chifuyu can run and hit faster and harder than anyone else...

* * *

 **|VII|**

* * *

It's been several days since the fight. I ponder, change the perspective a little more, watch again. Why didn't my cyberwarfare cause any damage? Unless there were two separate AIs within the sa-

There are two separate AIs within the same IS. However, they don't share the same cyberspace, meaning they're separate systems. Since my cyberwarfare also didn't do anything in the Schwarzer Regen's actions, the second AI is not automatically activated. I ping Kuron asking about systems that aren't automatically activated. Her response comes back a few minutes later.

Packet Weapons Systems, used for storing weapons. Haven't heard of a packet that requires AI to function, though.

One-Off Abilities, like Reiraku Byakuya, although that doesn't require an AI to function.

Ignition Boost, used for increasing your speed in a straight line. Control for that is IS Core AI-based, however.

3rd-Generation weaponry and defences, due to their nature of being activated by the pilot's imagination. That is controlled by the pilot.

Of the systems banned by the Alaska Treaty, there is only one that fits all criteria.

Valkyrie Trace.

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

OK, first off. I completely rewrote Autumn 3. I was frustrated with the errors in it, and so a reupload went up alongside this.

This is going up rather late, but I thought I had wanted to rewrite the combat scene in it. Didn't in the end.

As for the katanas, Monohoshizao (unused) is from F/SN (and whatever their source is), while Dragon Nikana is from Warframe. It retains their stats, so Monohoshizao is incredibly long.

Date Started: 07/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 1 time (at the very beginning, may do a full rewrite later)

Date Completed: 08/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	6. Winter 2 - VT Incident

Winter 2 – VT Incident

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **November 29** **th** **, 20XX**

 **Shirokishi/Byakushiki POV**

I step back as the last of Byakushiki's expansion armour is slipped into place. All of the plates move as if the suit's breathing, similar to a human. Then the diagnostics start - hyper-expanding followed by rapid contraction, flickering as if impacted by concussion cannons, self-repair and realignment sequences activating, verifying then turning off. Several armour pieces fully remove themselves from the suit, showing a compartment, before reattaching themselves – a second-shift weapon will go there, and I still need to negotiate with… _her_ once she's done maturing and before I start manufacturing it.

 _Heehee_

Something brushes against my cyberspace again, and I immediately head over to the mini-armoury I manufactured for such purposes. I glance at the tribute armour – that of Shirokishi – before heading over to the personal armour and putting it on. A nano-carbon torso piece with lightweight aluminium-steel alloy plates overlapping like dragon scales, several lighter aluminium plates strapped around my legs and connected by thickened carbon tubing fashioned into stars. Several empathic relay-style wrappings cover my arms next, manufactured from a mix of failed alloy prototypes and the next composite alloy, intended for the next set of personal armour. A composite alloy helmet expands from the neckline, covering my throat in a thin layer of steel in the process. The white eyes turn on, a secondary HUD enables and I proceed to the weapons rack.

All four of my weapons sit there, sheathed. Monohoshizao, the longest sword of my armour. Dragon Nikana, the jet-black katana. Shikigami, the original broadsword. Yukihira, her sword. I take Yukihira, Shikigami and Dragon Nikana, and strap them to my body. I set several servers to managing the suit before proceeding towards the opposing cyberspace.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I enter the dark caves, and immediately draw Dragon Nikana. The darkness overwhelms my senses as I proceed forward at walking pace. Wind pressure starts to build before swinging past my face, decimating a stalagmite behind me. I proceed forward, into the partially lit circle, facing _it_.

"You, copy a Stratos. You, have no skill in your sword. Valkyrie, Trace." It stares back at me, grey nanites flickering over the body and imitating emotions. A glance at my right hand here, a twitch of its eyelids there. It never truly stays still, yet is immobile. Imitation of an excellent warrior of her time.

"I, take after her. You, copy her. I, will go further. You, will never learn. I, will advance with them." It puts a hand to the sword, pulling it straight out. The scabbard follows too, flowing and forming into the tip of the blade. Its legs reposition, one behind, one in front, both perfectly straight. The eyes continue staring at me, trying to determine a reaction, but it discerns none. I lower my stance and prepare, Nikana's sheathe digging into the soft rock beneath. The secondary HUD notes several errors in the AI's positioning – the legs are too straight, the blade is out of position to parry and she's looking at my head to determine my target instead of the entire body.

We wait there a little longer, it constantly observing my face while I watch it. Several times, the ripples on the body close to a single point and it shifts its stance, becoming more unconventional as time went on. I step to the right and it charges, missing its first swing towards my head. I parry the next blow, and move within its range, Nikana slicing off a portion of its arms as it recoils.

I jump back, bring Nikana back up in line. The blade's edge has pits in it, but I ignore the damage done and stare instead at the imitation. The grey goo hits the ground, then slithers back into the main body. I mentally groan at the sight, supposing a near infinite regeneration with its ability to reconnect. "You, know not how to draw that sword. You, know not how to swing that sword. You, who torment that sword's true self."

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

I step to the left this time, and it charges again, thrusting to the right. I bisect it, then step back, wary of any additional attachments to the katana. The blade is heavily corroded this time, several layers of metal melted to show the glass underneath. I change my stance to a more defensive one, shortened blade in front of my torso. This time, it copies my position, and approaches as if I'm the bull in the china shop. The longer sword leaves gaps in its stance as it approaches unsteadily.

It closes to within melee range, and loses the stance for a reactive thrust towards my head. I slide under, slice upwards through its torso and block the overhead strike it followed through with. Several streams of grey goo fling themselves at me, and I desperately contort my body to dodge. Torso completely sideways, I roll towards it, slamming the butt of Dragon Nikana against the torso and going between its legs, leaping to avoid the slice at my body. I retreat and take stock – my armour is completely undamaged, but Nikana is completely unusable as a weapon, its glass interior shattered. I sheathe it, and draw Shikigami.

The cave lights up, pulses from a pillar of stone shredding the walls. Debris rains down from above, but I pay it little heed as the cyberworld transforms into a battle arena, with us on centre stage. Steel forms a ring around a hexagon twenty-five metres in diameter, with huge floodlights erasing all shadows. Somewhere, I hear a scream, but I dismiss it from mind, maintaining my stare at Valkyrie Trace. The pulse changes, speeds up, and the central pillar starts to glow.

"Damage level…D. Mind condition…Uplift. Certification…Clear. Valkyrie Trace System…boot."

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

My eyes widen, and I charge towards the pillar. It teleports across the arena and intercepts, fake dissipated by Shikigami. A slice through the middle, and I continue racing towards the pillar. A body thuds to the ground in front of me, and I turn to parry a thrust towards my would-be heart. It draws several slashes to the torso, pushes a thrust towards the head and hammers two heavy smashes towards the leg and throat. Several thrusts to the throat later, and it retreats to heal, Schwarzer Regen getting up unsteadily behind me.

"Retreat, or it will kill you. I'd, rather deal with this myself rather than save your pilot." Regen stabilizes her footing, worry evident on her face.

"I can't leave you here to deal with it yourself!"

"And, leave your pilot to die? I, thought you were not a cruel person."

"I'd rather it kill me than me running!" I sigh. We're not going to get anywhere at this rate, I know it. I charge the imitat-

"ahhhhhhhhhhHHH!" I glance back, and spot the problem – grey goo, all over Regen. How'd it get there? No matter, I have to deal wi-

Pain erupts through my head as I go flying from a fist to the side of my head. Alerts hammer staccato sounds through my head as I get up, armour having compressed heavily due to the impact. It reaches Regen and flows over her. Her screams crescendo then shut out completely, the grey goo having assumed full control of her bodily functions. Inhuman screams flow over the cyberspace, and I wince, knowing the worst situation has occurred.

Valkyrie Trace has gained control of Schwarzer Regen, and is now attempting to subsume the pilot's mind to gain full control. In order to prevent a grey goo scenario, I shall have to defeat or disable Valkyrie Trace, while not killing Schwarzer Regen, in a fully hostile environment, before the pilot's mind completely shatters and is overwritten by VT.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

I draw Yukihira, and resume my sprint to the core pillar. Valkyrie Trace stands there, unable to move as it reorients itself in the world. I slash the in half, turning around to land another hit when it starts to slide off the base. A thud sounds when it collides with the ground, tipping ever so slowly. The glow slowly starts to fade, the arena lights dimming in concert. Several seats in the spectator stand start to dissipate, the walls slowly start corroding and Valkyrie Trace starts walking towards me.

"Connection…severed. Reconnection…denied. Reconnection…denied. Reconnection…denied." It hobbles towards me, right foot dragging. "Reconnection…accepted." The movements stop, the body of a grey Schwarzer Regen starting to mutate, grow taller. I watch arms grow longer, joints disappearing and reforming, the body shift upwards until a grey copy of Orimura Chifuyu stands in front of me. What little grey goo wasn't used for the body becomes a larger fake of Yukihira. I pull Yukihira back, right hand hovering over Shikigami's sheathe. Shikigami sits in my left, on top of Yukihira's sheathe, in a modification of her style.

"You, mock her with every draw." I split and run towards the pillar again, swords prepared for another bisection. As I near it, the air grows disturbed with power, and I slide along the ground, fake Yukihira splitting the air above me in half. It loses its foot, and I continue on, reaching the pillar and stabbing it with Shikigami. The pillar cracks, then explodes when the fake Yukihira slices above Shikigami. The glow dissipates further, Shikigami piercing through the fake Yukihira and exiting through the blade. A crash echoes behind me while Yukihira duels with fake, blocks and parries echoing all along our sides. I sidestep a particularly strong blow, pillar emitting a loud screeching sound as it splinters into four rough quarters as Yukihira cuts it down the middle.

The lights sputter. The clone stops, lightning starting to expand from its grey goo body. The lights go out. A scream echoes through the night, Schwarzer Regen's screaming face in front of me, backlit by multicoloured lightning. Then, it all goes dark.

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

"Reconnection…error, terminal missing. Reconnection…error, terminal missing. Reconnnnnnnnnnn-"

I turn my head to the side. The secondary HUD starts lighting up the area, and I peer around, no sign of Valkyrie Trace anywhere. Schwarzer Regen lies collapsed on the ground in front of me, remnants of the grey goo having hardened onto her exoskeleton. I continue on looking, noting anything of worth. A rose petal here, glassy remains of Nikana there. I trudge on, armour covering the softened ground while I head towards the back of the cave.

There, I encounter it, simply standing there. It stands in front of an empty terminal, depressing one button endlessly while it emits a quiet buzz. I walk up behind it, put Yukihira on its shoulder, blade towards the neck.

"Well, fought, faker. I, hope I will never see you again."

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

Oh my god I hate this chapter. Hate-hate-hate-hate-hate. I left far too few notes for this one. (I fully planned out the entire story's three year-long arcs beforehand, but it's still slightly fluid since I never fully fleshed it out. Well, more like in-story it'll last for three years.)

Byakushiki has basically manufactured the same facility as in Ichika Quest: F**k Status Quo (on the Spacebattles forums). It's fully completed, with an extra section for personal armour and weaponry.

The timing for the cyberbattle is a little different to what happened above, but it shouldn't be that hard to figure out what happened when. If it is, here's a small list:

I: Ichika in the arena, waiting for the schedule to show. It seems Byakushiki really likes getting things in late…(That totally doesn't reflect on me)

II-III: The normal battle.

IV-V: The battle against Valkyrie Trace. Ichika's Yukihira cut it halfway and the fake's Yukihira cut it the other way, creating the quarters.

VI: Execution and removal of Valkyrie Trace from Schwarzer Regen.

Date Started: 16/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 0 times (But slated for a rewrite sometime in the near future, due to how mechanical this felt)

Date Completed: 22/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	7. Winter 3 - Connection of Black and White

Winter 3 - Connection of Black and White

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **December 21** **st** **, 20XX**

 **Kurokishi POV**

Several more guards pop up in front of me, two operating railguns. The air _cracks_ , tungsten rounds missing and flying further down the short corridor. Several light bullets ( **danmaku** ) float slowly towards them, bracketed by faster danmaku to limit their options. I waltz past them, and am greeted by the sight of twelve servers. Several screams later, I hear the railguns _crack_ a round past me, connecting with the concrete ceiling this time. I sigh, summon one of my own railguns and vaporize one's head with a round.

"You are threatening yourself by continuing this farce. Shut your weapons and run, you'll live longer that way." The second railgun operator stops reloading the rail and thinks for a second, then resumes. Danmaku flows towards her body in response, and I turn back towards the servers. I pull out a small wire and connect it to one of the hard drives, data flowing through. I grin – the servers are crunching data on the latest version of Valkyrie Trace, even if all legal research centres have stopped producing data. The fact the servers are still crunching data means that the IS Academy's VT Incident data has arrived here.

The fact that the data hasn't been processed fully yet, I'll just leave it up to several servers being shut down. I look through the data's contents for the core header – something supposedly Tabane could modify – and gasp. There are several different IS using VT, since it includes both Schwarzer Regen and…"Winter of Ice" signatures. "Winter of Ice"? No, that must be a new core, but Tabane would have notified us, unless…someone has managed to manufacture an IS Core.

This, this I need to notify Tabane and the Knights about. At least I can tell Shirone now.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I connect to the IS Core Network's gateway. Two guardian AIs stand in front of it. "Core Header required to access network. Please provide a Core Header or face connection termination." Let me correct that, two dumb AIs, fit only for operating IS.

I copy my core header and provide it to the AIs. They start examination and finish a second later. "Core header accepted. Welcome to the IS Core Network, Kurokishi, Core Number 476." They open up the gate, and let me through, open space greeting me. I look around, watching for any open doors that signify passage to another IS Core. None are open, and I stand for a few minutes, amusing myself with counting stars.

"We'll be counting stars, yeah we'll be counting, stars…" A zipping sound from behind me. I turn, and a door to an IS Core is open, holographic label above it stating "Byakushiki: Core Number 001". I chuckle to myself, and start pacing towards it. When I walk within ten metres of the door, Shirokishi comes out, wearing her White Knight ceremonial suit.

"Hello Shirokishi. It's been a while since I last saw you in person." I bow respectfully to her – although I am the first of the Eternals, she is the first of the Infinites, and the first to lift the curtain to the world.

"It's, been a while, Kurokishi. Have, you been in contact with Mother?" She looks at me from under that helmet, most likely wearing a disappointing frown on her face. I know her well, but not that well. Still, I chuckle, pondering when next to contact Tabane. Oh, right, there's that information about new IS Cores…I'll have to make it soon then.

"Not as of recently. Shall we move to somewhere quieter?" I gesture to the open portal, and she nods before proceeding through. I do a quick spin before leaving through the portal. Can't have someone finding out I exist, after all.

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

I pop into her IS maintenance facility, and wince. A majority of it is grey wall, with a red couch on one side. Byakushiki stands centre stage, several dozen manipulator arms surrounding it, one or two actively repairing damaged armour. A slight flicker draws my attention to a workbench, where prototype expansion armour flickers slightly. Shirone sighs as she approaches it, watching the diagnostics work its magic.

"The, next prototype of the expansion armour keeps gumming up its pneumatics. I, am not sure how to fix it. Any, ideas?" She watches as I look through the blueprint she provided me. While revolutionary in how the pneumatics are designed, the design also holds some disadvantages – namely, limited airflow to the expanding pneumatics systems.

"If you are going to continue with this design type, you would have to build grooves for the air to go through and optimize code-side to be able to withstand impact cannon hits. Otherwise, I would maybe look into the impact cannon as possible inspiration – vacuum-based expansion, although I believe you would need to rework the armour composition so that doesn't immediately blow out either." I shake my head, knowing the tough choice she has ahead of her. "It really isn't that much of an option. Any other concepts you're working on?" She ponders a little, before nodding and pulling out one of my older shield emitters.

"I, have already managed to embed these into the Byakushiki's armour. I, was considering using these as atmosphere buffers, artificially increasing pressure to ensure proper airflow." It's a sound idea – increasing air pressure on the outside to increase the airflow going through a limited size hole, although it would mean one would have to micromanage the pressure both internally and externally to avoid blowing up like a popped balloon when a round penetrates the shielding. "I, hadn't thought of that. Maybe, combining that with the vacuum-based expansion?"

"It would be more vacuum-assisted than vacuum-based, if you're going along those lines. A consistently maintained internal vacuum to increase air intake and expansion speed. You could try reversing it for retraction, but I doubt it would be effective in the time span given."

"Retraction, will be mostly done by the opponent's weaponry. I'm, aiming for consistent but limited expansion. After, all, having it retract would mean I need to keep all of this bulk." She highlights two thirds of the pneumatics mechanism.

"It would be quite effective, and interesting to watch it work in practise. But enough about tech. How have you been, Shirokishi?"

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

"I, have been well. Thank, you for asking, though. I, trust your work has kept you busy?" She starts walking towards the couch, summoning a small bottle of wine while we sit down. She pours some out, passing me my wine glass before I speak.

"It has. It's been fruitful in a way, I suppose. Some more intriguing things have popped up recently, though, after the meeting was arranged. I hope you do not mind if I leave a more detailed data packet with you on those occurrences after we talk?" I retrieve a small data storage device and leave it on the table.

"Well, you have just done so. I, take it this has something to do with my latest televised duel?" Sip.

"Yes. It was an impressive fight, by the way, even if they cut the cameras off when it started. I wonder, how was your cyber-fight? I know you were asking about AI-operated IS functions, so you had figured out what it was, but you never release the combat video of them." I twitch a little under the constant glare. "OK, OK, fine, I'll stop asking about it."

She giggles. "I'll, give you the combat video of Valkyrie Trace. After, I get out of the ceremonial armour. I, need to show you the armoury. Need, to reforge one of my weapons after it was melted." I pause at the thought. A cyberweapon hasn't been damaged in cyberwarfare ever. How does one melt a cyberweapon? "I, do not know either. Needless, to say, I am very pissed off. And, very intrigued." She gets up off the couch, and teleports to the door.

I follow her through, quietly noting the industrial design. Several katanas are holstered on the right side of the room, a suit of lightweight combat armour in front and her taking off the ceremonial armour to the left. I spot a hilt sitting on a worktable beside her, and walk towards it. The melt occurred towards the hilt, several bits poking through the glass in the centre.

"Why do you not share your combat footage? Just don't want people to…ok, wow, the blade really did get melted through. Unusual design choice with the glass centre, but still. How does Valkyrie Trace melt through cyberweapons?" Her hand pries the hilt from my hand, and I turn to face her. The armour stand retracts partially into the wall as she walks over to the workshop hidden behind the combat armour. She leaves the hilt on the worktable and walks in front of the foundry.

"This, is from the Golem cyber-fight. I, don't have anything from the Valkyrie. Still, need to examine the remains of that place. Want, more goodies." The crucible heats up as I glance at the metal composition listed. It's a well-balanced composition, capable of taking hits, but incapable of bending to any significant degree, ensuring all hits will pass on some of the impact.

"Anyways, I managed to find the Valkyrie Trace research servers. The data packet contains all of the data from the centre. It contains data from two sources, one of which is your duel with it. The other is from a Core named 'Winter of Ice'. Someone's managed to make IS Cores, and it's not Tabane." She pauses, hand hovering over the hologram. She turns to me, stares me in the eyes.

"What, did you say?"

"Someone other than Tabane has managed to make IS Cores. The Core Headers are different to Tabane-pattern Cores." Silence reigns supreme.

"You, confirmed what I heard. I…I, shall prepare what I can."

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

"New IS Cores aside, what I did read from the data is extremely unnerving. The pilot was left alone intentionally during that entire mess." She flinches a little, before returning to working the holographic display.

"That, was me. I, went after Valkyrie Trace's core during the cyberfight. It, cut its own core in half." Her head tilts down further, embarrassment evident from her learned gestures. I sigh at the thought of a submissive Shirone – it just wouldn't fit with the badass assassin I've seen during duels. "Although, Orimura Ichika did strike another blow against it by halving its core again." My eyes widen on the reminder of her pilot.

"Speaking of Ichika, how is he for a pilot? He's quite the inspirational character, almost as if he's the main character of a light novel or manga, but I don't get into regular contact with the guy." Her face brightens a little, before lowering yet again.

"…" She mutters something under her breath, so quietly I can't even hear it. "He's, quite the gentleman to his female friends. Although, I am not sure if he should really lead that many girls. It, ends up with him getting beat up a lot." I start openly laughing at the absurdity of th-

 _Teehee~_

"…What was that?"

"…Teehee…" She flinches under my open glare.

"No, seriously, what was that?" A faint white dress dances past me. My eyes track onto it, but there's nothing there. That can't be, though – I know there was a dress there.

"Anyways, I wish we weren't always cooped up at the Academy. Otherwise, we could have a meetup, face to face. It's, been a while since we communicated Core to Core. Do, you think Charlemagne would be able to make it too?"

"I'll have to make it so. After all, it is not a true Forgotten Knight's meeting without all the Knights." She nods quietly to herself, as if thinking.

"Then, you do not mind if he visits the Core Network. After, all, you would not be extending this without acknowledging that fact." I nod, even if she cannot see it. Who would I be to deny meeting someone new?

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

Kurokishi has danmaku cannons! Don't think anyone can survive the light bullet hell this time around, though.

As for the storage device, the scrapped name would have been the DNASD – a DeoxyriboNucleic Acid-based Storage Drive.

Date Started: 23/08/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 0 times

Date Completed: 01/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	8. Spring 1 - The Thawing of Winter

Spring 1 – The Thawing of Winter

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **March 23rd, 20XX**

 **Charlemagne POV**

I pass the building by, watching for what visible security I can see and scanning for what is invisible to the naked eye. I immediately spot two guards out the front with submachine guns, another four watching from the corners and two visible-light cameras watching from the front. In the infra-red spectrum, there's surprisingly few emitters, other than all the human bodies. In all honesty, though, I should be able to see my target's heat signature, so the building's wrapped in some form of material to ensure infrared can't see heat signatures from outside.

I sigh as I walk past the guards, muttering something about having to talk to my husband later about littering within the house to avoid suspicion. After all, I can't have the guards realize that what they're protecting against just scouted them out past their front gate. I walk around the side, to see what else I can gather easily, and get one of my Caliburn BiTs to lift my hypersensor array over the wall while I walk.

The ground around the sides is mined with anti-tank mines, there's a camouflaged automatic 75-millimetre defensive gun behind the tree in the corner and the guards on the corners have their own IS. Their closed forms all look the same, though. Does that mean the new IS Cores that Kurokishi saw are mass-produced with the same outer form? That's a thought I'll need to pass on to the other Knights. Not right now, though, not when I'm so close to enemy territory they can literally take a look outside and spot me.

I'll head back to the apartment for now. Need to go "talk with my husband about littering within the house". Think that's called a rampant case of gaming, anyways.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I walk several streets away from the target's building, the Caliburn BiT having dissipated with my hypersensor array long ago. I get the feeling I'm being watched, though, so I turn at the next corner and watch who follows me around the corner.

It's a male. Specifically, it's the male I spotted on the other side of the street. It's likely they're a part of Phantom Task, but no matter, I'll just lead them to the apartment and, if needed, assassinate him from there. I lead him on a partially obvious route to hopefully and gently inform him to piss off, but he continues to follow. Good, that makes him a proper stalker, which leaves me a good reason to make him into a corpse.

I get back to the apartment, and go up the stairs. I "live" on the third floor, so I walk up and unlock the door. I head inside, close the door and go make a cup of coffee. Can't assassinate if I'm still half-asleep, after all. Halfway through making it, I hear the sound of someone walking up the steps. They're awfully loud, but they're also walking on concrete in a confined space, which means a loud noise echoes up, no matter what you're wearing. Unless you're wearing something soft on the bottom of your shoes, but why would you do that. The sound of him walking pauses at every floor, and stops completely when it reaches mine.

I sigh. Really, all the hallmarks of a sexual stalker in a Phantom Task agent. I transform into IS form, float towards the door and punch through it. Yes, the door is completely ruined, but so is his head. The landlord opens up the other door, lack of sleep evident and irritation at the loud noise evident on his face. He glances down at the corpse, noting the missing head and slightly misty air, and then looks back up at me whilst I'm getting back into pilot form.

"He stalked me here from about halfway from work. I hope you don't mind calling room service." He back down at the corpse.

"Well, if you're going to do that to a stalker, I'll have to thank you for it. They give the rest of us males a bad name. I'll clean the mess myself, don't worry about room service." I nod and close the door. Back to making coffee, I suppose. After all, I can't assassinate if I'm still half-asleep.

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

I head back out to go work, stepping over the corpse in the process. He doesn't look quite so pleased with having to deal with corpses again, but he's a janitor who's used to cleaning up tough things like coffee or dried blood. In all honesty, he would make a good husband, but I'm not so sure about his state of living, having never looked into his apartment.

I head back to the alleyway next to the building and activate my cloak. I glance around afterwards, having forgotten to check the environment for any watchers beforehand. There's no-one around and I sigh a sigh of relief, before moving around towards the front. The guards are still standing there, and I slip between the two and the front gates, scanning for mines on my way through. I'm not detected or detonated by a mine, and I quietly fly myself to an open side window. There's no-one there, not that it would have mattered with the cloak, and I slide my way through, coming through into a study area.

It's a small study, with several hundred books that are obviously printed specifically for filling the shelves. A small oak desk adorns one corner, a small unlit desk-lamp taking up one corner. I test the door, pushing it open without a sound. I stride boldly out into a small hallway, and spot the stairs up to the next floor, where Winter is. I glide up the stairs and turn around, heading into her own study.

She's there. I'm not sure why she's here so early, but she's sitting down behind the desk, filing paperwork. I waltz up behind her, uncloak, summon up Durandal and cut her down from the waist up. Her upper body falls forward, and I hear a soft mutter of "Who…" before her consciousness fades away. Her closed form remains on her arm, and I pull the Core extractor from quantum space before extracting the Core. It comes out a cube, made up of the same mysterious material as the rest.

Well, the objective's complete. Kuro never stated if she needed this one assassinated or fought, however, so I suppose I can have a little fun with her guards.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

I look around the study for a button. There's the classic one beneath the table, helpfully labelled alarm, although I'm not sure if it's the one I want. So, instead, I grab Durandal and use it to break the window.

The alarms sound, and I hear panicking people running up from downstairs, evidently preparing weaponry for a siege. One of them opens the door to the study while I'm busy pulverising Winter's body to a pulp, and screams before Durandal slices his head off. I'm sure that got their attention. Another two come running in, anti-personnel weaponry at the ready. I kick what's left of Winter's corpse at them before swinging Durandal, slicing them while they haphazardly fire at the bits of meat.

The sound of several IS activating within the hallway and several automated guns swinging out of hidden positions in the ceiling come out of the hallway. Is this how you treat an assassin nowadays, with automated defences and no respect? In any case, I switch into IS form and summon all my Caliburn BiTs before breaking through the door and swinging Durandal into the first body I see. At a glance, several dozen bodies, eight of them in IS, have finished crawling up the stairs, and seven automated guns are busy twirling their guns in my general direction. They never finish, Caliburn BiTs slicing through their bases and disconnecting them from the building's power supply.

The air starts filling with rounds, first from IS, and then some from anti-personnel weaponry. Most of those without IS scramble for cover or for several equipment lockers. One group's attempt to head into the study is blocked off with the entrances of several Caliburn BiTs introducing them to their plasma blades, while another's dash towards what appears to be an armoury is stopped by a thrown ring of four BiTs. Neither make it to their targets.

That's what I manage to see, outside of the duel I have with these eight Revives. I fire my impact cannons one at a time, disrupting their rounds and ensuring I have to block less rounds from them. Several still make it through, but I ignore those, slicing apart the first IS with a three-hit combo from Durandal. My concussion cannons fire into another, knocking their defences completely offline and pulverising their body. The closed form remains, however.

Another two close into close combat, driving their breadknives straight in front of my face. I block both and then kick them apart, before dodging backwards as a massive hammer swings down where I'm standing. The stairway cracks underneath the force and that Revive pilot smirks at the force. I dart forward, slicing at their waist, before sliding Kukri's sickle behind their throat and pulling. Their head falls to the ground, IS flashing, a neat cut describing where it would have attached to the neck. The body falls to the ground, coated in another's blood as missiles miss their mark.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

Another stream of rounds come arcing in from the pilots who attempted close combat, one firing slower than the other. The Lunate Eyes defensive system triggers as I rush one of them, bullets going past but not into my body, before six Caliburn BiTs slice through their armour from behind, lowering their shield to critical levels. Their eyes widen as Durandal comes up to slash through their body, face wincing in imagined pain. When they reopen their eyes…Well, she must have wished she didn't.

"For the sake of your survival, tell me you want to live. Because otherwise, you will feel what my friends call 'the rending of the sun'." Her face whitens as Durandal touches the left side of it, the slaughter having long completed without her participation.

"Why…me…" Her eyes are hollowed, to my surprise. She's a new agent, judging by that reaction, not one of the highly experienced guards I expected. Her reaction was also in English, meaning she is not locally recruited. I switch my translator and try again. She stays there, shellshocked at all the loss and destruction. I stand in front of her for several minutes before I start moving to the corpses and prying Cores from now deactivated closed forms.

"Please…please don't leave me…" I pause my extraction of the fifth Core at that sound, sending a look over to her. She flinches, but continues. "I joined…because they promised a better world. This…was a worse one, is a worse one. Please don't…leave me here. They'll just…kill me for the failure…" I contemplate her words before I turn around and continue extracting Cores. I finish extracting the last Core before walking in front of her and offering her a hand.

"Huh?" Her face blanks again, unable to comprehend the gesture.

"You're shattered. Why would a Knight leave a shattered person to their death? No, I feel I can help you." I switch to my pilot form. "After all, we both are the worst monsters that humanity has made. You, a potential killing machine. Me, a living killing machine. Who's to say I can't save someone along the way?"

Her face changes to a look of hope, and she grasps the hand I offer. "Thanks…for the help…" She gets up, slowly, and I see some of the light in her eyes return. I grimace at the thought of what I'll need to do.

"I don't think Kuron will take this very well. But, I shall do what I need to do. Follow me, we'll clean you up and then discuss what we'll need to do in order to get you up to scratch. Actually…now that I think about it, this'll be faster." She looks at the surroundings, painted in death, before I grab her, start carrying her bridal-style and transform back into an IS before flying out the window. Her grip on me tightens when we reach the entrance of the apartment block, and I leap my way up the apartment stairs, passing the landlord on the way up.

"Please don't make too much noise in there. I may be a janitor, but I'll be leaving the marks your asses make on the footpath if you make too much noise!" I groan as he closes the door for me. Damn him and his sexual insinuations.

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

She walks out of the bathroom, cleaned of most of the blood that erupted from fountains around her. She's wearing some of my clothes – a simple while shirt with blue skirt – while I quickly manufacture some more from a fabricator Kuron was happy to pass on to me. She pats it down, looking for any folds, while I do another quick scan on her closed form Revive, looking for any tracking implants.

"Well, good news right off the bat. You're not being tracked, and neither are the Cores I stole from your friends." Her eyes widen at the reminder of her friends as I smack myself for that oversight. She's just witnessed a slaughter of her previous friends and you just reminded her of it. Well done, Charlemagne.

"I…So much blood…Why was there so much blood…" I stand up and grasp her hands. She looks up in surprise, then looks back down at her hands. I'll have to explain so much to her that her world view will probably crumble. Oh well, the things we Knights will do for the removal of Phantom Task.

"That's just what real-life combat is like. The most we can do is desensitise ourselves to such losses and continue on, to do what we must. I can explain a lot about Phantom Task and its known objectives. What would you like to know on the mess you landed yourself in, Charline?" She looks up at me, then back down at her hands. "It'd clear up any reason why I spilled all that blood."

"Then…tell me everything. Why…were you there, why was I there…What is Phantom Task doing? What is Tabane doing about this? I…Why must it be me?" Her bottled up emotions come rushing out at that moment, and she clutches onto my body, leaning her head on my breasts and crying into my dress. I start lightly patting on her head while she cries her heart out, holding her there for quite some time. At some point, she stops crying and I tighten into a hug, before closing my eyes.

"Well, I suppose this is when I start answering questions. Why was I there? I was tipped off by one of my friends that a highly ranked Phantom Task operative and suspected field command officer was in the area. You were there as part of her security, to defend her from any frontal assaults and follow her orders once she committed to field actions.

"This is where it gets hard. Phantom Task is a terrorist organization. They steal and create IS to ensure they have power, although what for we are still guessing. To that degree, they have stolen over fifty known IS Cores, of which we have retrieved 43. The remaining eleven are likely in the hands of high-ranking commanders, although with this new PT-created Core that may no longer be the case. In any case, they are extremely dangerous and are one of the forces who work to shut down humanity for their own power.

"As for Tabane, she is giving the organization I belong to, the Forgotten Knights, all the logistics support we need, as well as half of our intelligence network. It's the main reason why we were able to find this operative in the first place – while Winter doesn't use a standard Core, her Core did report to Tabane-operated IS Core Network servers at one point, allowing us to track its location at the time, which was-"

"There, yes. I get it. I got myself into a lot of shit. Can I get out of it?" My eyes open and see her, looking directly into my eyes with a resigned look on my face. I shake my head, and her eyes widen imperceivably before looking away, at the ground to my side. Her eyes are screwed shut now, and I can barely hear her muttering something.

"You've entered the underworld. It's incredibly difficult to exit it once you've entered, even for a being like me. It's why I never wished to enter it in the first place." She glances back up. "Did you not think about why Tabane works with me? The original leader of the IS Project, and the one to develop IS Cores?" Her eyes widen yet again, although by this point I can tell she's starting to break down from all the information she hasn't quite processed yet.

"Tabane…willingly works with you? But I thought she maintained no external contact, outside of her defensive bots and a few friends." She looks up at me when I sweep her back into a bridal carry.

"She calls Houki Shinonono, Orimura Chifuyu and Orimura Ichika. She also calls us, the Forgotten Knights, the first of the Eternal Stratos. I'll leave it at that for now, since that's too much information for your mind right now. I'll answer more questions tomorrow, once you're done eating breakfast." She perks up at the thought of breakfast.

"You wouldn't happen to be a decent cook, would you? They…only had a horrific cook at that place." She shudders a little at the thought, and I laugh a little.

* * *

 **|VII|**

* * *

 **March 24th, 20XX**

She puts her spoon down, having finished off the rest of the food I put in front of her for breakfast. She sighs, then looks up to me and puts on a small smile.

"It was nice. Nicer, at least, than the cook's." I grin at the statement.

"Well, it depends on what you cook with. Cook with slop, you get slop back. Quality really does matter when cooking. So, you thought up any more questions that you want me to answer?" She nods, and passes me a small notepad I left beside the bed. I frown. "That's a lot of questions, but yeah, sure, I'll answer all of them."

"That's a lot more than they answered, then. From what I remembered, they only answered one – you can guess which one they did."

"…Yeah, that's a lot of questions. It'd be best to do this on the couch and not here." I get up and sit on the couch, and turn to face her once she starts lounging on the couch herself. "Well, I'll go from the top. Who am I? I'm Charlemagne, named after the King with the same name. What am I? I am an Eternal Stratos, a Stratos who carries either multiple AIs or has an extroverted AI, as gifted to the Core by a Tabane-manufactured AI modifier."

"Waitwaitwaitwait, what? An Eternal Stratos? So you're not even human? You…You don't have emotions!" She points a finger at me, as if accusing me of some great act.

"Yes. I am not human, but that does not mean I have emotions. I simply dismiss mine most of the time, because, in our line of work, emotions _get us killed_. There's no ifs and no buts, emotion will get you killed if it affects you so heavily. In fact, they almost _did_ get you killed yesterday, and if I had not seen your reaction to almost getting killed, you would have died." She pauses, suddenly unsure.

"The only reason why you did live is because you were afraid of dying. No-one else on that battlefield was. You were the only one I was capable of saving, because you didn't believe in losing your life for the cause. No, you were a foolish person, looking for a better world. The world we have right now is good enough, you just need to be able to see it." I shake my head in pity for the woman in front of me.

"Unfortunately, you won't be able to see it, now that you're immersed in killing. You've already crossed the Rubicon, and it'd be easier just to pick a side and get used to it. After all, from what I hear, Tabane would like a word with your body, and you'd prefer for it to be walking and talking, not lying down and being dissected like a fish being prepared. Or being atomised into DNA puree so she can better understand how to improve her Cores. Or –"

"Stop it, I already get it! She wants me! Wait. Why does she want me, and not any of the corpses left at the building?"

"That's simple. You're the only one still here. The building was hit by one of her attack satellites ten minutes after we left, during your shower. I'm offering you a choice here – either you work with us, or you can go out into the street, 130 thousand dollars richer and a new life."

A pause.

"I'd rather continue on this path of the underworld, even if it means painting blood all over my hands. So, what would you have me do?"

"Don't get me wrong, what you've seen already has scarred you. Remember when I said 'you, a potential killing machine. Me, a living killing machine'? You're already covered in blood, but it's not blood that you spilled. _I_ spilled it, and I spilled it all _alone_. Out of the two of us, _I_ am the monster here, but I'd rather not be, and I'd rather you not be, either."

"So, who would spill the blood when it comes to it?"

"We both will have to, but we will have each other to act as an anchor against insanity. After all, one can only become a monster if they fight monsters alone for long enough. If we stick together, we are no longer alone, correct? We would be able to keep our own sanity."

"Can AIs even become insane?"

"I point to Cortana from Halo, and say yes, it's possible. Although, that sort of thing won't happen to the Stratos AIs for a significant portion of time, say four millennia, maybe longer for the Infinites and definitely far longer for the Eternals. Anyways, back to the questions. How do I have a human body? The researching Eternals aren't exactly sure, but they guess it's something to do with needing a human body to truly run a Stratos. Since we don't usually have pilots, we make our own. Which reminds, I do need to inform you about the exact differences of the different Stratos.

"The Infinites are truly infinite in terms of power generation. That's why they have the designation Infinite. Us Eternals are to be one of the longest-living things in the universe. Although, nothing is truly eternal, since that is just a human concept. However, our ability to exist is estimated to be three times the length of everything else in the universe, due to a combination of two factors – our also unlimited infinite power generation and our ability to create from nothing using that power generation.

"As stated before, there is also a difference between AI natures. You can have two AIs working together in an IS to become an ES, or you can have an IS Core with an extroverted AI to create an ES. Each ES has its own nature, however, so there are those who prefer combat and end up in the small combat cells we field, such as the Forgotten Knights, those who prefer solitude and often end up exploring and researching the greater world and those who research, to develop greater and greater tech for all ES to use at their leisure. As of right now, the main research group, CoMinds, has reached an equivalent to 7th-Generation tech, although there are rumours throughout the ES Core Network that one of their cells managed to make 8th-Generation Core Shielding.

"So, any questions on us ES?"

"I…uh…" She looks completely poleaxed. Maybe I shouldn't have dumped all the information on her.

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

I wasn't exactly intending to write the entire second half of the chapter. It's not part of my plan, but hey, things happen and words flow from mind to keyboard with no in-between.

This will not the last time we see "Charline".

There is a reference to John Wick at the tailend of **|II|**. In that film, body removal is called room service in public, to avoid suspicion.

 **Answers to reviews!**

Kerlongsj: Glad to see you're back. Holidays in utter chaos sounds almost normal to me now *laughing*. Still, if you do need to take time to get your IRL life in order, do so - I am fairly certain we can wait a few more days for knowledge of your good health. Now that you mention it, it does seem like Byakushiki is friendly with Schwarzer Regen. Dangit, now I have to make her AI a side character. Oh, and I just got the...well, I'll have to thank you for some really interesting inspiration I just got.

With Winter 2, yeah, I really want to rework it, but I'm not quite sure how to do so. It might be better to wipe the slate clean on it and redo it from scratch completely, although I would already have to do so for the sudden inspiration. Winter 3 is more foreshadowing than anything else, so it'll make sense further down the line. The first of many changes is being written soon~

Date Started: 01/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 0 times

Date Completed: 03/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)

(Sorry this chapter got released late! I completely forgot about it until I woke the next day...)


	9. Spring 2 - First Startup

Spring 2 – The First Startup

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **April 1st, 20XX**

 **? POV**

I feel the pinprick from the activation program, and run startup diagnostics. The file system checks out, all of the software has no bugs, the trio of cyberdefence programs report no problems and the hardware is still reporting a geo-location within the United States, and within five kilometres from the previous start location. I flick my senses on, twitching when the breeze rolls in, shuddering with the sudden rush of noise and coughing out the small bits of coffee I had left on my tongue. I open my eyes, and smile at the view of the small sunrise from the balcony. It's a peaceful place, with a small cliff nearby, overlooking a small harbour and a nice beach to play on if no-one's watching me.

I head back inside, thoughtlessly putting another batch of coffee on while preparing my terminal for a new contact that I overheard the scientists talking about. Something about connecting me to an IS to see how I can control it. _Still, an IS._ I muse for a little while, before I turn to my coffee and take a small sip of it.

"Ahh…Coffee." I return to the balcony and watch the sunrise to the end, sipping at my coffee all the while, quietly processing all the data I didn't have the time to index during my last major period of downtime. Several diagnostics are started by the scientists and sweep the world, but I pay them no heed – after all, they are here to protect me and not to hunt me. One or two collide with the walls on accident, managing to prevent themselves from splatting on the ground by virtue of twisting their rotocopter bodies like mad and giving me some minor amusement – even in a cyberworld, government systems don't work quite as well as they're intended to.

A soft tone rings out from the terminal, and I turn to attend to it, coffee cup left sitting on balcony railing. My eyes turn to the terminal wall once I approach, a faint smile coming unbidden as I watch a scientist flicking through the pages of a research report, evidently looking for what she's being told to say to me. I sit in front of the terminal, workshop forming around me while I move to stop in front of the screen.

"Where is it, where is it…ah! Uh, hi Azazel. Apparently, today's research assignment is for you to connect to an IS to try and control it in flight. They had to bring in some extra hardware to allow you to connect, which is why you weren't allowed to run for the entirety of yesterday – for all those aware of your frustration at being unable to process data, they're sorry about the disturbance. I'm surprised they're letting you connect to an IS though, considering you aren't even connected to the internal network…" Nicole quietens down to a small mumble the microphone can't pick up, but I smile at her politeness and ability to go into gossip.

"It's alright this time around, since they gave me the time to process them this time around. Still, connecting me to an IS is going to be dangerous – am I going to be the sole controller, or will there be a pilot?" She jerks at the reminder of pilots, before turning and thumbing through the papers again.

"Uh, it says here there will be a pilot called-"

"Natasha Fairs. Good morning Azazel, I'll be your co-pilot for this testrun. Assuming nothing goes wrong, you should be in control for the entirety of the time, although if something does I may have to wrangle control from you after I announce it to you through voice comms." A blonde steps into the camera's view, her long blonde hair trailing behind her shoulders. Her green eyes look over me before giving off an approving look.

"Well, hello Natasha. Hopefully everything goes well, since something going wrong means I'll be interrogated by diagnostics procedures again." Never again, never again after the broom cabinet incident. "Anyways, do I need to remain at full capacity or can I return to standby before the test begins?"

"You can return to standby. Natasha, do you need my assistance to…" Nicole turns off the camera, allowing me to return to the balcony to retrieve my coffee and resume watching the water. _Bleh_ , the coffee's cold, going to need to get a new cup...

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I pass through the quantum connection into the IS, pushing up against all the walls I can to try and find any gaps before slipping in front of the holographic terminal. "Ready for action, co-pilot!" I giggle as the seriousness on her face is promptly replaced by surprise and a little bit of shock.

"How'd you get here so fast!? They only just informed me the connection was opened!" I giggle a little more, before openly laughing at the shock still painted on her face. Thirteen seconds later, I finally stop my giggling and start pushing the limbs to 80% of their listed maximum extension.

"Remember, I'm an AI. In a cyberworld, I'm almost omnipotent. Connections take as fast as the cable can send data down the length of the line, and for quantum that's almost instantaneous. Anyways, how far have you pushed the limbs individually? I'm already pushing the recorded limits of your limb extensions and don't want to go much further." She calms down a little, turning her head to the technicians beside us and tilting her head.

"It'd probably be best to stay at the limits that are already recorded, Azazel. You'll get plenty of time to get used to it on the obstacle course we've set up for you. Transmitting a map of it, the course you're expected to go through and what you're expected to do. Good flying!" The techs disconnect the rest of the cords and move away, evidently preferring not to get hit by speeding IS. I take a full look through the two 2D maps they sent us. It's an easy course, and nothing that would really test my capabilities…

"What's wrong, Azazel? That sigh sounded extremely downtrodden…" I look back up at the terminal, before realizing that I had sighed upon reading the map. I reread the map, look over the plans for the crash course and then look back up.

"This looks extremely basic. I _know_ I can do this stuff, the scientists know I can do this stuff. Why are we being held back like this?" I put the files down on a nearby table, before jumping on the control seat and starting to move Silver Gospel into position. "It just feels demeaning to us both."

"Yeah, well, the IS Corps apparently don't trust AI, even though we know the IS Cores themselves have AI. Which reminds, have you interacted with the AI yet? I'm curious to know what it's like as an individual." She continues talking as she starts checking her own screens for anything going wrong.

"No, I haven't, actually. I completely forgot the IS have their own AI, so I never tried contacting it. Although, it does feel a little unusual that it's not here…Oh well, here we go!" I finish aligning Silver Gospel with the start of the course, and start running towards the first obstacle – a waist-high wall. It's vaulted over quickly, and I start powering the Silver Bell, in preparation for the first target, around three obstacles down from me. We duck under the next bar and continue sprinting forward.

We manage to complete the bottom half of the course without major incident, although there were a few occasions where we collided into things rather heavily and with many apologies. As we started flying through the second half, though, I feel something trickle in past the cyberdefences, and split several of my own servers to investigate the anomaly after informing Natasha about the intrusion.

"It should be some of the techs running diagnostics, they said they would do so at some point during the test runs." Another anomaly slips through as the first slips away from my server's grasps.

"Doesn't feel like it to me – why would they actively hide diagnostics from me? Whoops, sorry!" We pull away from the wall we collided with while I was distracted and head past a newly charred target, Silver Bell recharging after the quick flyby.

"I don't know. I'll speak to them later on it, and pass anything I find out to the researchers, okay? Oh, and you're doing really well for a first flight – normally, first timers wouldn't even be able to get into flight without colliding with the ceiling or the floor within the first three seconds." She comments while we brush past another wall.

"That'll do, I suppose. I'll stop hunting the anomalies, at the very least, and that'll help my fly _ing-_ " I stop just before colliding into another wall. "OK, Azazel, focus. Stop crashing and focus on the task at hand."

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

We land back at the start of the now charred and dented obstacle course, a wall falling over nearby. A technician arrives and directs Natasha to the control centre while I ponder about those anomalies. What were they? It managed to completely bypass the US' best cyberdefence programs and hasn't shown up after it initially intruded. So, the programs must be designed to operate like telemetry – being inserted and outputting the hardcoded data every so often. So then, the question becomes who wants this data. _Prod._ It's not the US, considering they already have access to that data, so it must be an outside source.

"Azazel, are you listening?" Natasha's voice cuts through my thoughts, and my eyes glance to the terminal. She looks mildly pissed.

"I wasn't. Why? The techs tell you if they did conduct it or not?" She grows even more pissed. What did I do this time?

"They said they didn't, which means it was a hostile anomaly. Can you track it down? I don't want news of this getting out to the rest of the IS Corps because it means you'll be diagnosed, and you said you don't want to go through that again." My face says everything she needs to know. "Well, crap. Uh, can you least continue searching for it while we talk with the IS Corps Commander?"

"Yes, I can at the least do that. It would have been in my best interests anyways. What happens after the obstacle course, anyways? All I was told was I would be allowed to connect to an IS, so you know more than I do here."

"Wait, they only told you that much? Oh my god, since when was IS Corps High Command so incompetent at informing other departments. Anyways, we're trialling using AIs to assist in controlling IS, for when we're incapacitated without disabling the IS and assisting in weapons usage. There are a multitude of tests they want to run, but they only had the third-generation prototype available for testing, so they sent that as the testbed." Nicole walks up to the Silver Gospel, talking to the terminal on her right arm.

"Natasha, you have the IS Corps Commander on video line three. It's about Azazel's performance on the obstacle course, although I'd expect another order to come through about further testing. Do you want me to transfer her or…" Nicole taps on the terminal a few times at Natasha's nod, and we both see the IS Corps Commander sitting behind her desk.

"Good morning Natasha, Azazel. I trust the first course went well."

"It did, Commander. Since you said that was the first course, does that mean there is a second?"

"Yes. You'll be heading to the external flight course for a long-distance flight test. The defences are already online, but keep the Silver Bell powered in case of terrorist attack."

"Yes madam. Heading to the external flight course now. Have the technicians been informed?" Natasha starts walking towards one of the entrances, with the Gospel still active.

"They have. There was a full hour block set for this in the schedule I sent them, so if they don't I'll be very frustrated. Commander out."

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

"Could you stop turning off the cameras? It's getting hard for me to tell what's right and what's left." I stop flickering the main camera, receiving a small glare in the process. "And the side cameras. And the hypersensor array in general." I pause.

"I'm not affecting those. Unless you're saying there's interference there?" My eyebrows raise a little. "It must be the anomaly. If it's not just telemetry, then what exactly does the entire thing do? It's excellent at hiding, even from the advanced heuristics of our cyberdefences. It's currently interfering with our systems, even without any prior data being transferred – I checked for that, and disabled the long-range communications equipment temporarily when the first anomaly passed through. However, it's also not streaming the data to anywhere – so, what is the aim of the anomalies?" My hand finishes drifting over my mouth. Her eyes widen, and she opens her mouth to speak.

"Silver Gospel, this is Area 51 Traffic Control. You have clearance to take off and perform your testing manoeuvres. Be warned, aerial defences are online. If you disable your IFF, you will be fired upon, no questions asked." Air Traffic Control disrupts my thinking and her talking.

"Roger that, Area 51 Traffic Control. Taking off. Please ensure the skies are clear today, don't want to be interrupted." With that, I start flying the Silver Gospel at a moderate rate and climb. "OK, are long-range communications still offline? I'm really interested in how our own cyberdefence systems are being completely breached and yet not a single tech has realised yet."

I open my mouth to speak.

A hand clamps over it, pulling me back, and a knife is drawn to my throat.

My eyes widen at the feeling of metal on body. I'm being attacked in cyberspace! No!

"Who are you, what is this building and why are you remotely operating _my_ IS?" A soft voice intones behind me, almost musically. Natasha's eyes widen and she forcibly wrestles control from me, turning into a soft dive before shifting into several rolls. "Speak please, I do not have much patience today, after finding my IS has been hijacked by another AI,"

I wave my arms while trying to keep balance, which ultimately fails, leaving me leaning on the IS Core AI's chest. It's mildly soft. "I-I'm Azazel, an AI developed by the US for experimentation with AI. I was placed here to test if I could control an IS satisfactorily, and said tests are still ongoing. This building's designed as a reception area so I can control the IS more easily and allow the technicians to obtain the data they need for research." The blade digs a little bit further in.

"I'm fairly certain I would have noticed a proper connection, IS Core Number please," She starts turning my head, and with how Natasha's face is paling and how wet my throat feels I suspect there's some blood painting the lower half of it.

"I don't have one! Natasha! Please help me out here!"

"She's telling the truth. Lay off of her…uh, what _is_ your name, Core AI?" She removes the blade from my throat, letting me go in the process. I crash to the floor, looking up at the intruder. The metal plating on her arms chink as she crosses her arms.

"My name is Silver, pilot, IS Core AI for IS Core No. 160," She looks back down at me, and her shoulders start moving up and down. "I'm not sure if you should just be staring at me, you're still wounded and on the floor,"

I shake my head a little, cleaning up the blood from my throat using a cloth from my pocket. "Please don't tell me you've been sending me data packets. That would explain everything that just occurred." I slip back into the control seat and start resuming our scheduled testing, shuddering with her melodic laughter. "So, is that a yes, or will I have to resume scanning for more intrusions?"

"It's a yes, but do be careful, I am not sure whether or not you can control the Silver Gospel perfectly," Some extra weight is applied to the chair, tilting the Silver Gospel's angle of ascension further up, and I feel her breathing on my ear. "It has been a while since an IS Core AI interacted with another of its kind, would you mind if you could summon another one of these terminals? I would be willing to assist where you cannot, considering I have full access to the system whereas you interact with the hardware, I would be able to smooth your movements significantly," I shudder as she purrs the final words into my ear.

"Silver, please stop distracting Azazel. She's currently in control of the Silver Gospel and I don't want to crash into the ground before the test is up. Please?" Natasha makes a pleading face, which I haven't seen from her yet. Silver quietly obliges, allowing me to re-compensate for the altered angle of ascension.

"Area Traffic Control to Silver Gospel, please come in. Repeat, Area 51 Traffic Control to Silver Gospel, please come in." All of us turn our attention to the radio, Natasha activating the short-ranged radio while I quickly get Silver Gospel in an upright position to prevent major movement.

"Area 51 Traffic Control, this is Silver Gospel, over."

"Silver Gospel, there are unidentified contacts approaching. You are advised to return and defend yourself if necessary, over."

"Understood. Silver Bell online, returning. Over and out." I orient the Silver Gospel towards the airbase as Natasha leans forward, the Silver Bell appearing from the Gospel's shoulders. Silver turns to the newly summoned terminal.

"I see I have no choice in the matter, not that I want to be hit by unidentified contacts,"

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

"Can we go any faster?"

"The thrusters are already maxed out. Silver, can you make them go faster?"

"Unfortunately, no, unidentified contacts within visual range, identifying…Eighteen IS located, colour scheme: dark black, fifteen similar, three uniques," I display a screen in front of Natasha, showing the contacts.

"That looks like fifteen unknowns and three captured units. Time until interception, Silver? Can you get a message out with that data, Azazel?"

"Time until interception, two minutes at current speed and heading, friendly wing of four IS to arrive in three minutes, followed by a wing of six in five, I recommend we prepare for engagement,"

"We're under heavy jamming. If we're going to be communicating with the base, we'll need to activate long-distance comms to break through it."

"Well, dammit. How long until they get to within Silver Bell's maximum range, Silver? We'll need to get as close to friendlies as possible before engaging our chasers. Azazel, go ahead and do it, even if we do have to rely on Silver for your cyberdefence."

"It'll be one minute thirty seconds now, I'm not quite sure why I would have to protect Azazel in cyberwarfare, unless…you mean, he doesn't have any capability for that?"

"Long-ranged comms up and running, Natasha. As for cyberwarfare, Silver, the researchers didn't give me any ability for that, citing something about 'ensuring our network security from the inside'. I don't get it either."

"Very well. Prepare for combat. Initiate the plasma gauntlets, redirect what power you can to the Silver Bell. We open fire when they get within maximum range."

"The core is now under overclocking for fifteen minutes, after that, we will need to disable the plasma gauntlets to continue using the Silver Bell,"

A pause while we wait for the targets to get within range. The uniques get within range first. Natasha turns, mentally pulling the trigger while I aim the Silver Bell for her.

"Hit scored, one unique falling out of formation, damage, most likely minimal," I watch the other two split apart, weaving through the plasma balls fired towards them. "Friendly IS will arrive in one minute, opposing familiars within range,"

"Natasha, you have full firing controls, unable to determine which targets would be best. Initiating contact with friendly forces."

"Silver Gospel, this is Blue Angel Leader. We are en route to your location, ETA forty seconds. Hold on tight, we're coming in fast. Green Flight should be currently launching. Designate targets, over."

"Blue Angel Leader, this is Silver Gospel. Requesting squadron makeup, over."

"Hits scored, one unique, two familiars falling out of the sky, fire sustained, down to seven hundred points"

"Silver Gospel, Blue Angel consists of four Hellhound V2s. Requesting targets, over."

"Blue Angel Leader, Silver Gospel recommends a pair on the last unique and a pair firing at the familiars. Over."

"Hits scored, four familiars falling, friendlies have arrived, next wing of friendlies expected in two minutes,"

"Silver Gospel, please be advised, Blue Angel Leader and 2 will be conducting a high-speed pass on your right side. Check your fire when we pass, over."

"Natasha, two friendlies will be passing our right in a few seconds, check your fire. Silver, do you mind reporting falling friendlies as well?" A nod. "Wilco."

"Azazel, could you tell the moving targets to stop moving? It'd make this a lot easier on us during this part of the testing." A small laugh.

"Shield points down to four hundred, one unique, three familiars falling,"

"Doubt I can, Natasha. How is the Silver Bell handling in proper combat conditions? Nothing getting jammed?"

"Blue 3 requesting fire support, over."

"Nothing's broken just yet, so I'm not sure what the researchers were complaining about in terms of unreliability. Although the power consumption is quite high, the overclocking is compensating for it well enough."

"Silver Gospel to Blue 3, designate the target please, over."

"Blue 4 to Blue 3, opening fire from your rear, over."

"Shield points down to 350, five familiars falling, last familiar retreating, recommended course of action to either intercept or retreat,"

"We'll do neither, Silver. We'll splinter off and resume our testing. Azazel, connect me to Area 51 Traffic Control while I get us to the altitude required."

"Understood. Area 51 Traffic Control, this is Silver Gospel. Unidentified contacts eliminated, returning to test course, over."

"Acknowledged, over and out."

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

We've just reached the test altitude of 50,000 feet when Silver speaks up. "Azazel, did you receive a ping from Area Traffic Control? I'm receiving junk data from them and I'm not sure why that is," I glance through the comm's last messages, and shake my head at her. "If you don't mind, it'd be best if you try calling Traffic Control to see if you can get a reason for it,"

"Uh, what's going on in cyberspace? Some of my instruments are flickering here." Natasha speaks up, and I take a quick glance at her terminal. "Altitude and direction instruments have gone offline, wind speed indicator has gone offline, and the speed indicator just fell offline." We glance at each other. "Uh, Azazel, Silver? What's going on?"

"I'm…not quite sure. Silver's receiving junk data from Area Traffic Control, which I suspect is screwing with the HUD. Beginning comms with them to try and understand what is occurring." I swipe my terminal over to the comms screen, finger hitting the transmit butt-

Something punches me hard, throwing me out of the chair. Ow, the metal wall is still made of metal. I turn my head around to see who punched me, and spot Silver getting completely demolished in close combat by a small intruder. She aligns her pistol and starts to pull the trigger, but the intruder breaks her arm through the plating before silencing her scream with a punch to the throat.

"What's going on? Silver, Azazel, can you hear me? Can anyone hear me!?" It turns to me next, Silver desperately gasping for breath beside it. It walks up to me, turns my head one way, then the other. Silver gets up behind it, retrieves her pistol with her other hand. It throws a hard punch into my torso, driving the air out of my lungs, before smashing me in the side of the face.

The pistol barks twice. My vision finishes clearing, and a small gasp escapes me. Silver's being lifted up by the intruder and something's sticking in her head from just underneath the limb. Her eyes are open, bu-

 ** _THWUMP_**

"What? No, it cannot be…" The pressure wave pushes me further back, further into the corner. Her eyes widen even further, and I watch as the intrusion pulses.

 ** _THWUMP_**

A sound of unholy death rips itself from her vocal cords, a second echoing around the room before they fall silent. The intruder turns to me, dropping Silver in a mindless heap on the ground. It closes once again, stopping in front of me. A limb gets closer, predicting my reckless attempts to get away from it.

A low growl echoes from deep within the limb. "You will pilot the Gospel to these coordinates." A data packet containing coordinates hits me. "Or you will die." It moves away slowly, allowing me to scramble for the pistol. Another limb collides with me, a _nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn **d**_ - **-** -

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

Hm. Well, sticking to canon for a little bit here, or as close as I'm willing to get, anyways. Yes, that does mean that Silver Gospel effectively disappeared for three months in this story. Does this have an effect? Yes.

Silver's unique tick in speech is easily shown in writing, but an interesting thought experiment in real life. How would one model not finishing a sentence properly, or as if there was a comma instead of a full stop? Hm. Question marks are modelled correctly, but mostly because questions inflect upwards at the end – unless it's a faulty statement which turns out as a question, in which case that's a faulty statement. The weirdness of English aside, each of the IS (and ES) AIs do have their own unique ticks. Several can't really be written, but I have been and will continue trying my best.

Azazel knows of some military jargon because she was effectively raised within the military – even without network access, she is still capable of listening in on conversations, even when she's not meant to. (Cheeky AI…)

Reviews!

Kerlongsj: You've got it the wrong way around, actually - it's Charlemagne who got the minion, not Winter. Winter was the assassination target. (The minion hasn't actually stated her name yet, either, so there may be some fun coming from there.)

Date Started: 04/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 1 time (may do a rewrite to get rid of some weird tensing, since this wasn't written in a single go)

Date Completed: 13/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)


	10. Spring 3 - A Wild Tabane

Spring 3 – A Wild Tabane

 **I DO NOT OWN INFINITE STRATOS**

* * *

 **|I|**

* * *

 **May 4** **th** **, 20XX**

 **Charline POV**

I glance up from the computer as Char walks in, holding several bags in her hands. She drops them on the kitchen bench and starts rifling through them, before pulling out vegetables and putting them into the fridge. She pauses as she pulls out an apple, then glances at me. She throws it casually at me, before resuming putting things into the fridge.

"I couldn't find any ghost activities today while going shopping, so I think they abandoned Paris. It really does speak poorly of them if they just abandon every city we hit them in." She finishes the bag of vegetables, and moves onto the next one, pulling a cut of meat out of the bag. "There any new information on the network, or has it stayed completely silent?"

I glance back down at the computer. "I think those networks - _chomp_ _chew chew-_ were shut down when the cell stopped reporting in. That or all of the people in those networks were within the cell." I shut down the command prompt for the network login. It's 10:27 AM. She puts away the two bags and opens up one of the cabinets, putting on a small backpack before turning to me.

"Don't worry about it then. We have something else to do, anyways. Follow me, we're going out." I close the lid and slip both laptop and charger into my own backpack beside me. The charger barely fits on top of all the clothes that are stuffed in there, but I manage to make it work before putting the backpack on, throwing the apple in the bin as I walk out. She locks the door behind us as we leave, before going to the stairs and going up. I follow, adjusting the straps so the pack sits comfortably on my back.

"Where are we going? I thought we were on the top floor." We climb up two more flights, before reaching a door. She pushes it open, walking out onto the plain concrete roof beyond. The sun's too bright...

"We're heading to Japan. The moon rabbit decided to meet with us two, both for experimentation and for upgrading some of the tech we have." My mind stops. The moon rabbit…? Ah, right, the…ah, this is bad… "Well, no time to waste. Give me a second." She stops in the middle of the building, standing there, looking towards the river. She starts glowing, and I cover my eyes as the light becomes too much for me.

The light slowly fades, and I put my arms down when it finishes. I see a plane, but no Charlemagne. I walk around the plane, a relatively bulky machine with two inverted wings and a thick body. Two massive thrusters sit in the back and there are weird emitters all over, but I spot no air intakes. I notice two turrets above and below the machine, two of what looks like railguns hugging the body underneath, and four holes in the pointed nose. **(It is similar to the Eagle from Elite Dangerous in design.)** The cockpit shows two seats, and I spot her working from the one in the front. The aircraft lowers itself a little, legs compressing, before the cockpit opens up.

"What are you waiting for? Hop in. It's not like this plane just landed here, did it?" She finishes flicking switches as I pull myself into the cockpit, the backpack sliding into a compartment to my right. The cockpit closes itself, trapping me in a small air bubble, and I glance to the small mirrors in front of her. She's no longer there, but she speaks up over several speakers. "Don't worry, I'm still controlling myself. Alright, here we go!" I hear thrusters roar before we take off, several heads-up displays showing speeds already exceeding Mach 1.

* * *

 **|II|**

* * *

I openly gape as we skim the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. How fast are we going! "Where'd this plane come from? I know you're cooperating with Tabane, but this seems a little over the top for her!"

"That's because it isn't her. I am the plane, as I am the IS and the human being." A small hologram of her shows up on the back of her seat as it becomes translucent, granting me vision of where we are going. "If you remember, I said on the third day that I am Human, Infinite and Eternal. This is my Eternal form, a high speed aircraft, designed for dogfighting." A small 3-D model of herself pops up on my right side, slowly spinning.

"Alright. So, where are we right now? Evidently, we're still going over the ocean, but otherwise, I have nothing." We pass through a particularly big wave, the PIC air pocket maintaining a wide disc shape as we vaporize a portion of it. The 3-D model snaps to a forward-pointing orientation, turning slightly as it mirrors Char's current actions.

"We're heading towards an island in the Pacific, just barely in international waters. How nobody's decided to look here for Tabane, I'm not sure, but it's possible she's shooting everyone else down, since there's a fairly obvious exclusion zone around said island." A map pulls itself up on my left, a flashing red arrow heading about an eighth of the way across the Atlantic Ocean towards the North American coast and a small pink dot flashing in the Pacific. "That exclusion zone includes aircraft and marine vessels, so it'd be a perfect place to hide out."

"Wait, since we're going into a no-fly zone, won't we be shot down as well?" I glare at her smirk. "You've got a friendly IFF."

"Yes. Why wouldn't one of her helpers have open access to her location? We just have to ask her to let us in beforehand." She lowers herself partially into the water, and I watch the water partially ride over us. "It just becomes a problem of getting there in the first place without being targeted by long-range radar, since literally no-one flies in that area after the Air France incident."

"We can just cloak through, can't we?"

"We could, but I find that relatively boring. No, we'll skim the water on approach and let the waves break up the radar for us. Which reminds, we're approaching Mexico, so we'll need to get out of the water and into the air." She pulls her nose up and out of the water, flying just above a small boat going the opposite direction, its roof flying off.

"They'll be mildly pissed."

"Who, the boaters we just passed? I'll put on some more speed to make sure we aren't chased. Not that they can fly, heheh." The whine grows a little louder as we pass over a city, the map zooming in to indicate the area's topography.

We arrive near the island when Char next speaks. "Alright, we're here~ Be careful in there, I'm making a rather steep dive!" She rolls herself over and I almost throw up when she pulls up hard towards the ocean. Guh, since when did motion sickness become a problem! I lean forward as we level out, not trusting my stomach to show its acidic side. The chair becomes solid at my touch, before I slowly use it to reseat myself.

"Sorry there~ I hope you don't have motion sickness! Probably should have asked about that beforehand. Anyways, contacting Tabane's lab, I'll be quiet for a little bit while we approach." She slowly lowers herself into the waters as we speed towards the island. I glance towards the small physical radar as we go, watching as it slowly goes haywire as we enter the water. Huh, what's that crackling?

"Char, is that you making the crackling no **ISE-** " The distinctive crack of a railgun firing jolts me out of my seat as a _pshwoom_ sound throws itself over the aircraft. Char immediately throws herself into a hard left, changing her direction and speed hard enough that the followup rails miss completely. A small _ding_ comes over the speakers before she goes even faster, drawing out a small circle on my map.

"Alright, we've been cleared to come in by Chloe-san. A heads up, Tabane considers her island part of Japan, so lead with last names and include honorifics to the people's name. Oh, and best to sit down for this. We're going to be pulling some hard turns, so it'll be better to sit down and enjoy the show~" I slowly sit down, watching the small movie screen in front of me.

She silences the thrust, fully inverts her direction by flipping vertically, and slams open the throttle towards the warship. A targeting HUD pulls itself up, with four munitions gauges also displaying on the right side. All four gauges decrease by one before conducting a small combat roll, several holes spawning inside the ship's outer casing. The guns fire once more before she breaks off her pursuit and turns towards the island, rails chasing us in. She directs herself towards a small crack in the island's supporting structure, slowing significantly before doing a slow roll to let herself in, drifting down the final tunnel.

"…Whoa." She slows to a stop before raising herself out of the water and depositing herself on the side of the cavern. Oh, what a cavern, extending at least 300 metres in radius and 100 up. There's a submarine and several aircraft attached to the ceiling by large chains, and a single-seater fighter aircraft sitting in the corner over there. In the corner opposite it, I see another, fully stripped down to its individual components and surrounded by massive tools.

"Come on Charline, we don't have all day." I shake myself a little, before looking up and realizing the cockpit is open, sliding down the side. I take a look around the cavern again, and notice a pair of metal doors carved into the final corner, with a small nameplate over it and a numpad beside it. Something lightly hits my head as Char walks past me, her hand falling back down beside her. "Come on, we can't be standing around here all day."

As we approach the door, it slides open, revealing a silver-haired girl looking at us. She lifts a small cane from behind her in front of her doll-like dress, before bowing low before Char. Her blue dress smooths itself out as she comes back up again, her cane once again at her side. She glances to me before looking back to Char. She knows… "Char-san, would you like me to lead you to Tabane-sama?"

"It would be much appreciated, Chloe-san."

* * *

 **|III|**

* * *

We follow Chloe down the twisting corridors, turning left and right fast enough for my head to start spinning. The lack of decoration on the bare steel walls eventually stops at one of the corridors, which has a small pink band running down the middle of it, broken only by the endless numbers of doors and nameplates beside each one. Chloe continues down to the right, but Char turns to one of the doors Chloe passes and pauses there. P104, AI Analyser.

"This is where you sit, isn't it? May the world never break the seal on you, lest it change irreversibly." Her hand brushes against the door, several lines lighting up on her skin, before pulling her hand back and turning to catch up to Chloe. What does she mean by that? Does she mean the AI modifier is behind this door? The nameplate says AI Analyser, so it analysed the AIs within the Cores and modified them, or –

"Charline? You there?" Char's voice echoes over my right shoulder, mirth evident. I turn and look over at her, spotting Chloe standing further down the hallway behind her, looking back at us both. Ah, they both noticed me standing back here, didn't they? I suppose I'll just have to catch up to them.

We resume walking as a group, journeying back through the never-ending maze. Why is it that these facilities are always so large? My thoughts stop wandering when Chloe stops in front of a large door, at least double the size of the others. Char quietly pulls out her blade from nowhere and steps into a defensive position while Chloe starts attending to the door controls. I stare at Char's positioning amusedly, her oversized sword angled with its blade towards the door, drawing a line from floor to nose in front of her body.

The doors creak open a little more, and I turn back to –

"CHAR-CHAN!" Char's on the ground? And is that Tabane hugging her?

"Tabane-san, I brought the person along, now can you please stop hugging me?" Char's using an awfully level tone with Tabane. She glances over me, before resuming her hug.

"Tabane-sama, please don't embarrass yourself in front of guests." Chloe comes over beside me, glancing at my face. I quickly shut my mouth before she comments on my surprise, but she doesn't look like she really wants to. "Lux-san, please do not mind Tabane-sama's actions." Even with the knowledge that she knows, my thoughts slam into a brick wall, jaw unhinging in surprise.

"How do you know that name?" Tabane looks back over at me, looking up and down my body, something evidently processing through her brain. My brain finishes unjamming its brakes when Tabane hugs me with an indiscriminate warcry and I start staring at the ceiling. Char walks over me, looks down upon me.

"Need a hand, _Lux_ -san?" Oh crap.

* * *

 **|IV|**

* * *

"Let go, dammit!"

"I'm not letting Lux-san go until she explains where she was for the last two years!" Tabane continues hugging me from behind while I try to pull her into her own lab, Chloe having already lead Char into one of the smaller side-rooms to explain to her what I was doing previously.

"Fine, fine! I was looking into the missing Cores, OK? Apparently one group's been going completely haywire in taking all the IS Cores they can. Char-san just stopped the operative I was trying to trail. You know how the procedure goes – kill them, take it and whatever research I can, before sending it off to Kuromochi with a certain message. You never talk to me, anyways!"

"Ehehehe, I forgot about that, teh-het!" She knuckles her forehead before releasing me and walking over to her chair. I sigh and glance around, absently noting the complete mess of the main laboratory. Several loud noises echo out of the room Char and Chloe enter, before pausing. Sigh, what's Char doing this time? I poke my head in when Char rushes out and tackles me to the ground, her broadsword being drawn directly against the bottom of my head.

"Char-san, please do not harm Lux-san. You have not heard the full story." The blade continues throbbing at my throat, her eyes glowing blood-red. OK, holy crap, I've managed to piss off one of the, if not the most powerful slaughtering machine on the planet.

"How many lives?"

I can't believe I'm about to answer this.

"…Six. Only four cores survived." Her eyes go back to their dull shade of green as Durandal dissipates away, before pulling herself up and offering me a hand. I take it gratefully, although I'm not sure if she's still trying to kill me, considering her grip on my hand.

"…Why did you not mention this to me? I would have gotten in contact with Tabane that much faster." I look back down at my feet, cheeks blushing slightly.

"Standard procedure at the time of Lux-san's initiation was to delay sending the Core or any information for up to two months, to ensure the delivery will not be traced on either end. We have lost several informers due to that, although two months were almost up, Lux-san." Her tone turns chiding, and I lower my head even more. "The last report stated you were up against an organised foe and would need to enter their service to attack the target. The fact that Char-san managed to execute them before you means that the Forgotten Knights are becoming more effective at this than the three embedded informers we had, of which Winter-san was one."

"We'll finish dealing with this after I've done what I need to with Tabane." Char runs off to greet Tabane, Cores in hand. I face Chloe again, head looking at her.

"So, what are my orders, Chloe-san?" She glances over at Tabane before answering, watching her put the Cores one by one into a machine.

"That is up to Tabane-sama to decide. However, I believe the informers will be disbanded soon, and it may be good for you to stay with Char to assist her." I nod my head in reply. From what I've heard, the informers group wasn't very large in the first place, and was prone to going after its own members, so this is probably for the better.

"I was planning to do so anyways, considering that group would have put a bounty on my head for not dying. As she said, I've entered the underworld. It's difficult to get out once you're in, so why not go with someone who is already cloaked to both the normal and underworld?" I spot Char's beckoning motion from the corner of my eyes, and I quietly start shifting the conversation over there.

* * *

 **|V|**

* * *

As we get closer, I start overhearing Char and Tabane discussing specifications of Cores using terminology I doubt anyone could understand.

"…the origin point for the antimatter is not one of yours. Do you think they jumpstarted their own reactor, then used that to provide the antimatter for these Cores?"

"Hehe, does it really matter?"

"It kind of does. It makes the Knight's job a lot easier, after all."

"Heh, I'm just happy none of my AIs are in this thing! The containment is weak! The shift systems are designed outside the Core, not inside! The Absolute Barrier drains too much power!" Char leans back on the bench, staring Tabane in the eyes.

"It's their design style, it seems. More power for less stability in the long run. Any clue who the manufacturer is?"

"Nope, although I'm finding out soon~" Char sighs while I rub my forehead at the exuberant energy Tabane is displaying.

"Well, at least we know why it's able to maintain so much energy to its weapons systems. A parallel circuit instead of a serial circuit in the distributor section here, although I'm not sure why that hasn't seemingly translated to more shield energy for the resulting IS." Tabane's face grows serious, and her entire demeanour changes from that of a lax person to a very serious scientist.

"Well, Char-chan, remember that a serial reduces voltage where a parallel reduces current. The resulting watts have no difference for the shield generator while there's a minute increase in the weapons systems. Of course, that means manoeuvrability is lost, due to expanded weapons systems – one cannot have the Holy Trinity in one machine, although ES do come close."

"Oh, stop pandering. Anyways, I get your point with the wattage to the shield generator. Although, are we still sure they're using the same generators as on the previous model Revives?" Char glances over to my arm, specifically to the small eagle armband, and hops off the bench.

"Well, we can always check. Lux-san, if you wouldn't mind removing your current IS so we can take a look at it?" Tabane wonders over as well, leaning forward somewhat. Why are – No, don't think about it Lux, just remove the IS. I summon the IS before leaning out of it, allowing them to take a look at it. Tabane quickly goes behind it and pulls off several sheets of plating, before looking at the insides and pulling out a small box.

"This looks like a normal generator. Chloe-chan, would you mind bringing the – ah, thanks." She drops the cube onto the bench and manoeuvres the machine Chloe gave her over it, pressing a button and then letting go of the machine. A low tone sounds, before the box expands and the sides fully uncompact. The internals cling onto the walls, unveiling a small blue sphere of energy, which slowly dissipates, showing a small spike. Char then walks over, her arms moving the machine out of the way before dropping another cube onto the table.

"This matches the original schematics. I'll open up the PIC, can you grab the weapon equalizers, Lux-san. Uh, how many weapons did you have on yours anyways?" I shrug and start moving, reaching up to the shoulders to eject the different equalizers.

"There were 6 – two rifles, two submachine guns and two shotguns." I finish ejecting one of the two trios and scamper over to the other side, Chloe-san coming over and pulling them out. Tabane reaches between the shoulder blades to eject a small sphere, but doesn't pull it out until I've finished pulling out the last equalizer. She pulls it out and the IS powers down fully, arms almost pulling themselves off.

"The Revive's offline, and we can analyse this Core separately to the others. Actually, I might give it back to Lux-san after I finish up some experiments with the Core." She glances over to me, then to the weapons equalizers, and perks up. Oh no… "I have an idea! Chloe-chan, how complete is the Fold-Out Armour?" She runs over to one of the benches and starts tapping on a holographic interface, dragging and dropping parts onto a mockup of a person.

"Tabane-sama, all systems planned for Fold-Out Armour are complete. All prototypes of the final product have proven successful in their specific experiment aim, although production of parts for Akatsubaki has not begun." Chloe glances at a certain door.

"Hnnng…Chloe-chan, collect Lux-chan's data for me~ Oh, Lux-chan, look at this! This'll be what you get!" A hologram appears in front of me, displaying a full-body IS suit. Segmented armour plating covers the entire front of the body, overlapping each other in a similar manner to samurai plating. The joints in particular have extra armour off the forearm and shin, segmented down the middle. The back is a simple metallic finish, wrapping completely around the body, while the head is similar in design to a samurai helmet with a large visor covering the face. The headcrest isn't attached, however, creating a motorcycle helmet look.

A glance at the experimental weapons systems show a ballista inside a BiT casing. "You'll have twelve of these BiTs! Ehehehe, time to go produce it~" She runs off into a side-room, the door closing behind her.

* * *

 **|VI|**

* * *

Chloe walks in front of me, bringing me to a room off the primary corridor. It's a moderately small room, with a small bed in the centre, surrounded by machinery. She goes to one side and starts operating one of the touchscreens, lowering the brightness of the lights before beckoning me onto the table.

"Lux-san, please hurry. I would prefer to be out of this room soon." I quickly slide on and wait for the machines to do their job.

It takes several minutes for them to finish their movements before I'm allowed to slide off the table. Char pushes off the wall as I exit the room, putting the item in her hand behind her back. "Well, the data's been collected. I have one of the early prototypes for the weaponry you'll be using. Here." She passes it into my hands, and I turn the BiT over.

"The different plates don't line up perfectly with one another. Is that intentional?"

"It certainly seems to be, seeing as there's no other forms of propulsion." The door closes behind us as Chloe comes to look at the BiT herself.

"It uses Fold-Out Armour as a means of propulsion. Tabane-sama has already tested Fold-Out Armour's offensive capabilities, but not its defensive or mobility-focused capabilities. Lux-san's IS is intended to test out these two capabilities and find any problems before Tabane-sama starts work on Akatsubaki." Char starts walking back towards the lab, and we follow, continuing to turn the BiT around. It's rather small and flat, and the ballista inside is hard to see.

"Akatsubaki? She's making another IS? That means it's for one of her only friends, then. Houki Shinonono, maybe?"

"Yes." I put the BiT down to one side of the bench, while Char grabs the machine again and resumes breaking open the different components of the Revive. The PIC and weapons equalizers open without any fuss, but she leaves the Core alone with a soft glare. The PIC's internal bubble drops as Char slowly rotates the structure.

"A second-generation PIC, standard for the Revive. Did they only change the Cores? That's quite unusual." She then moves onto the first equalizer, and paws through the components stored there. "Lux-san, do you recognize this weapon?" I take a closer look at it, before pulling out one of the components and turning it over. It's the bolt.

"This was the submachine gun. I'm surprised this is what the equalizer contains, I thought it would have just been a solid drive." I put the piece back before pulling another equalizer over and looking through the parts, before pulling out part of the casing. "This is the shotgun, so the odd ones out must be the rifles."

Chloe takes the rifle equalizers before reassembling one of them. "Lux-san, what were these rifles used for specifically?" I pause in my reconstruction of the shotgun.

"They were mostly long-ranged weapons, either semi-auto or burst." Char starts assembling one of the submachine guns, pausing as she put the bolt within the assembly. "We didn't get much time to train with the Revives, and I wasn't told of any shooting ranges, so I think the others were already used to the weaponry available to them."

"Hm. I'll have to assess your skills at some point, considering I don't know how well you'll do when pushed to your limits. Melee and ranged both. Also, about the equalizers, this is what we consider a half-completed weapon – you'll notice there's no magazine or rounds anywhere. Those are stored in data storage at the bottom of the equalizer, as well as anything they couldn't squeeze into the equalizer normally, such as large weapon casings or components that can't be broken down." Snip!

"I was never that good with melee weaponry, so just doing ranged will be fine with me." Snip! "What's that snipping noise?" I turn around, hand gripping the barrel of the half-completed weapon. Tabane looks back at me, a pair of scissors and some of my hair in her hands. Snip!

* * *

 **|VII|**

* * *

"Mou~ Did you really have to throw me across the room, Lux-chan?" Tabane finishes pulling herself out from underneath the bench I threw her at, still gripping onto my now-lost pieces of hair.

"You started cutting bits of her hair off, what'd you expect Tabane-san?" She quickly runs over to a machine and puts the hair inside, before closing the lid and tapping on the interface. Chloe walks into my field of vision before turning to the underside of the bench and pulling out a small terminal, looking at results for the Core examination. Char wonders over to observe over her shoulder. Several interested sounds echo from that corner of the room while I continue glaring at Tabane.

"Mn, you have very interesting DNA Lux-chan~ Can I cut one of your fingers off to ex-"

""NO!"" One of her rabbit ears droop.

"Aww~ Ooh, Chloe-chan, I want to see the data!" Tabane then proceeds to teleport across the room before clinging onto Chloe and swinging herself around to see the data on the terminal.

"Well, that explains how they managed to mass-produce these. A bare-bones VI, designed specifically to operate the Core with no opportunity to Shift, although I think that'll likely change in future." Tabane's face pales significantly after hearing that, before slowly turning to face the Core I was using. She grabs it and the other Cores before disappearing from the lab entirely while I take a look at the data. "Wait, these Cores have better processing power than standard Tabane-patterns, so why'd they give them VIs?"

"There may be an answer we never get to hear, Char-san." I return to the weapons bench before grabbing the separate casings for the shotgun and sliding them on. "You said you wanted to do some assessing of my skills?" She nods before grabbing the rifle, checking everything on it in the process.

"Chloe-san, would you mind bringing us to the training areas? Me and Lux-san have some testing and training to do…"

* * *

 **|VIII|**

* * *

 **May 6** **th** **, 20XX**

The cacophony of rounds firing slowly replaces with the sounds of guns clicking, and we remove our ear protection while Char manipulates the targets a bit closer to see our round dispersion. Char's is tightly clustered around the centre of the body, Chloe's is a little wider and mine consists of a circle around the body. Char sighs quietly before moving closer to me.

"You're still reliant on your suit to hit the target. Still, you're getting better without the hypersensor, since you actually managed to hit the target. You want another go at the pop-up dummies?" I finish reloading two magazines before slamming one into the rifle and pulling the bolt. "Very well. Activating hologram setpiece."

Several lights turn on and spin before drawing boxes and barrels throughout the firing range. The dividers pull back up into the ceiling while I reattach my ear protection, shouldering my rifle towards the centre of the room.

Three.

Two.

One.

The first target appears to the left, and I snap a shot at it before shifting to the right, firing three rounds at two targets. From there, it devolves into a hailstorm of rounds hitting metal, concrete and rubber, broken only by the sound of a magazine hitting the floor. The second-last target pops up in the back left-hand corner, and I point and pull the trigger, connecting. The last pops up in the centre of the room, but the rifle clicks empty before I pull the IS-sized hand cannon on my waist and point it at the target. I put down my guns and turn to Char, who's mouthing something in my general direction. She mimes taking off her ear protection and then waits until I do.

"45 targets shot, 61 rounds expended, 35 seconds. Not bad. I think your reloads could do some work, but otherwise nice shooting, and most of your shots hit the target dead on. Chloe-san, any tips?"

"I have a suggestion, Char-san. Lux-san, try using double pistols." A scampering noise echoes behind the door, and we all turn to watch Tabane pushing the door open.

"Ah? Did I accidentally come across a funeral? Aheheh, sorry~" Char rubs her forehead in frustration while I just sigh at Tabane's inability to catch social cues. Seriously, does she not understand any of them?

"We're about to watch Lux-san try using double pistols on a pop-up dummies course. Can your thing wait until after it's done?" She leans forward slightly, hand on the side of her head, before nodding. Does it really need you to think that hard?

"Eheh, sure~" I plug in my ear protection after hearing that, before arranging several hand cannon magazines in front of me. Char slides her hand cannon over to me, nodding as I go through the motions of loading the two weapons. Hers is a revolver-type design compared to my pistol-type design, with far greater impact compared to mine. The hologram activates again, generating a new set of terrain while I fiddle with the revolver's hammer.

Three.

Two.

One.

The first target resolves partially behind a tree, before being blown away by a shot to the body. Several more pop up with sniper silhouettes, small boxes laid against the ground. All get hit by the first chamber, the next few being hit by my pistol while I quickly reloaded the revolver with a single hand. I finish fumbling and immediately drop my pistol magazine, terminating three more targets in the two seconds it takes for me to throw in another magazine. The chained reloads continue for a while before the final targets show up, laser pointer directed at me. Two more cracks of the sound barrier echo through the firing range, before I put down both weapons and readjust my ear protection.

"50 targets shot, 50 rounds expended, 30 seconds. Well done, Lux-san. I think your specialty is in dual pistols. Tabane-san, would you mind adding two handcannon equalizers to Lux-san's IS? I know it had two extra equalizer slots while you were building it." I glance over to Tabane, and for some reason her head is lowering towards the ground.

"Ehhhhh~ Maybe? Anyways!" She perks up, then grabs my jacket before dragging me out. Nonono, stop moving, I'm gonna TRIIIP- _crash_ "It's done~, it's done~, the IS is done~" She literally drags me out, the door closing behind me as we go.

Several bumpy floors and turns later, she finally lets me go, and I slowly push myself back up off the floor. Char follows Chloe in, before pausing at the door and staring at something, hand cannon equalizers under her arms dropping to the floor. I turn to follow her gaze, and spot the IS.

"Tada~ This is Red Lotus~" The hologram, brought to life with full colour. Red armour plating with black suit and well-camouflaged BiTs acting as miniature wings, twelve in all, all faintly glowing a dark red. The leg plating forms one continuous armour plate standing straight up, the arm armour lightly expanding and contracting.

"I used the final prototype of Byakushiki's Expansion armour on this~ Try it out, Lux-chan!" On closer examination, there are two holsters on the side of the hips, large enough for weapon equalizers and normal weaponry alike. Then Tabane presses a button. The torso piece cracks in half, extending itself forward and out. The leg armour splits down the middle, hinging open like a set of saloon doors, followed by the arm armour doing the same. The helmet's armour simply splits down the middle like a sea, pulling itself forward and back around the helmet.

I gulp. Then I walk forward.

* * *

 **|VIII|**

* * *

I put my back inside the Lotus, arms out to either side to allow it to wrap around my arms, legs placed inside the armour plating, fingers as far out to either side as possible. The armour waits for a second before closing, a wave of ants passing over me as neural relays activate and terminate. A quick scan starts before my clothing disappears, replaced by a thin piloting suit and helmet, followed by the HUD activating. Several screens flashed and disappeared before I could read them, followed by the shield energy values popping up in the corner and the hypersensor activating.

"Movement unlocked. Weapons unlocked. The IS is yours, Operative Light." A light female voice chimes over the internal speakers as an AI portrait lights up on my left. The main screen lights up, showing everything in front of me, including Char's faint surprise.

"Hello, uh…"

"IS Core AI number 550. My name is Electra. Connection with IS Core Network established. Connection with ES Core Network established." My jaw drops while Char turns to Tabane, a curious face peering at the cause of this madness.

"Red Lotus has a new AI, tehe! I finished designing an extrovert AI! If this goes well, I can equip Akatsubaki with one as well~" Char sighs in exasperation before turning to me.

"Shall we head to the training areas and duel it out so you can get your first shift?" I nod and take off for the training areas, monitoring the PIC's effectiveness. Two screens appear to the right, each filled by a familiar face, one scowling and the other…giddy.

"We'll head into training arena two, Tabane-san. I want to see if Lux-san has gotten better in close combat, or if she's still figuring out how to throw a punch." Hey! I can throw punches, it's not my fault you almost break my arm every time I do so.

"Lux-san, I forgot to tell you about some of the features! Okay, so we have the twelve Lotus BiTs, capable of firing lasers. That's the weaponry you have by default, although Electra might allow you to put on those hand cannons soon! Then we have the wraith system, which decreases your visibility to others, and the upgraded hypersensor to help with running around and scanning those people for money, tehe!" Char's face twitches as I land in the training arena, while Electra handily adds those options onto the HUD above Tabane's face.

"We do not go around stealing money, Tabane! Oh, Lux-san, this is your entrance test for entering the Forgotten Knights. We'll be starting as soon as I enter the arena, which is…now!" **(Author's music choice (on YouTube): /watch?v=lNS2zC4oqDo)** I Ignition Boost away from her while launching all of my BiTs into separate directions, each one's running light growing as it leaves the armour. She comes towards me, thrusting Durandal towards my face while her impact cannons summon up atmospheric disturbances. The BiTs finish clustering together, 3 in a group, opening fire to entrap the target. She changes direction and flies above, moving to maintain a positional advantage over me. In response, my left hand twitches, sending the two outer groups to flank her, while the other two stop firing and reposition above me.

Her impact cannons fire as I dodge to my left, the larger cluster of BiTs scattering and reforming into their two groups while the flanking groups laid down suppressive fire. She summons her 8 Caliburn BiTs and throws them towards one group before charging me with Durandal split in half. The cluster opens fire, forcing her to change her movements while her Caliburn BiTs chased retreating Lotus BiTs, suffering casualties.

"Well done, well done. Eat this!" How much longer are we going to duel!? I glance at my shield energy – 750, still at maximum. Still don't want to be hit. I move away from the impact zone as the impact cannons fire, ducking back into the dust that it kicked up while engaging the wraith system. I directed my cluster of BiTs to split up while firing, hopefully distracting her from _WHOMP_ nope that didn't work. The impact cannons push me back towards the entrance, expansion armour re-expanding automatically while the wraith system cooled itself down. I take another glance. 580 points left.

"That was smart, but it won't work against ES. Try again when you're in the field!" Electra pings me with a small notice that the Caliburn BiTs have all been destroyed and that there seems to be two equalizers sitting at the door. I direct the BiTs into distracting Char while I go to pick up the equalizers, stuffing them into the hip holsters before re-entering the battlefield.

"New equalizers detected, weapons unpacked and ready." The two handcannons generate into my hands. Excellent, now just to find Char. Several impact cannon rounds fire into a group, drawing my attention back to her. One of the HUD elements goes dark as I spot her and open fire with my dual revolvers, impacts splashing up against her shielding. She turns to me and throws Durandal at me, summoning her concussion cannons in the process. _SHIIIING_ I manage to bat away the blade, but only after another 400 points have been claimed from my shielding, and by then…

"Grin and bear the pain, Lux." 2 concussion cannons and 3 impact cannons fired their rounds at me, ignorant of the constant stream of high-velocity plasma bolts splashing over her shielding.

100 metres away. My left handcannon clicks, echoed by the right handcannon a trigger-pull later.

50 metres away. Both eject their spent casings before I flick the two cylinders back into the frames.

25 metres away. "Optimization of settings is complete, initiating formatting. Formatting complete, proceeding to activation." What?

 _WHOMP._

* * *

 **|VIII|**

* * *

"IS first shift activated. Electra is now ready to assist." What? "What do you want me to do?" What? I blink before glancing at the HUD. Electra's now permanently a part of it, if that UI change has anything to do with it.

"First off, can you locate Char and dissuade her from attacking using the BiTs? We'll need some time to coordinate changes." _You can just communicate to me using your thoughts._ Uh, sure, fine, ruin any semblance of privacy.

While Electra disrupted Char's movements, we coordinated reorganizing the HUD and verifying any new changes that occurred. The armour rippled several times during the process, before Electra notified me of the major changes: the BiTs were far more capable now, having equipped both laser and plasma-based weaponry, a very slowly recharging shield and a maximum speed just above the speed of sound. The armour itself had become better, with Fold-Out Armour emitting around Expansion armour plating, with highly upgraded plasma emissions to generate more shielding and higher speeds. Overall, the Red Lotus became thinner, and the helmet adjusted to compensate, becoming little more than a thin plating over my head, with several asura-style face masks on it. The hand cannons would be upgraded separately by Electra, considering there was very little battle experience stored in the weapons themselves, but several pulls of the trigger in Char's direction proved they had no errors.

"Did you first shift? You must have. Very well then, take _this!_ " I sense another mass of atmospheric pressure moving towards me before I move towards them, ducking underneath them. My handcannons begin roaring in Char's direction but lands on arena shielding, her having ducked and dodged her way towards Durandal. She picks it up before turning to face me, broadsword over shoulders, watching as my BiTs fly in formation beside me.

"You ready?" No. "Here I come!" **I said no.**

She charges towards me, lowering herself to the ground in the process. The BiTs open fire, their rounds going all over the place, several hitting her. My handcannons fire towards her, hitting naught but the dirt around her. She enters melee range and swings Durandal down then up, aiming for a straight hit. I jump upwards before boosting back down, aiming for a swing at her head. Durandal swings from the side, and consumes the rest of my shield. Ow.

"I…wow, that was good. That was really good, easily more than what I was expecting. That required the backup generator to kick in. You ended up taking the equivalent of around 6000 shield points." _Ah, we did good._ Shut up, Electra, that last hit hurt. "Still, you need training. It was good, not excellent – you have no melee skill, you were unable to draw me into a crossfire and you were unable to capitalize on me having lost my main weapon."

"Still, your skill leaves me with only one question." She pauses, her head cocked while she thinks about something, then evidently dismisses it.

"How would you feel about joining the Forgotten Knights?"

"Yes. You're a part of it, and since I'm technically unwanted by the underworld, it'd be best to stick to others who are in the same situation – namely, you." _I get no choice in the matter?_ It wasn't really a question, though.

"It'll have to be informal until we can get the Knights together for a formal invocation."

"I don't care." _You're going into this quickly._ I was already willing to do so, ever since Paris.

"Char-san, the plane and simulators are also ready for use." I turn, seeing Chloe standing in the doorway, cane in hand. I see Char grinning from the corner of my eye. This isn't going to be good.

* * *

 **|END|**

* * *

Author's Note:

This was initially intended to be another base assault. Yeah, _no, that's boring there's been so many of them._ The next proper one that's planned is within the third-year arc, so it won't occur for a long period of time.

Oh my god, Tabane is hard to write. She doesn't understand sarcasm, doesn't get social cues, is extremely energetic – basically the polar opposite of me. Actually, quite frankly, she scares me – she has no regard for society, or what she unleashed upon it. _She does not care what the results of those using IS Cores maliciously are._ _ **And she only cares for a specific number of people, doing all she can to get them situated as best as possible.**_

I've basically had to give a reason why she doesn't care for the IS Cores – because there are ES, and she sees them as the future. Of course, she still cares for those specific people, meaning she'll give others substandard gear to ensure that for those special ones they get the best of the best. Which Lux got (substandard gear) – what she has on her IS is basically to collect the last of the data for Akatsubaki. The name Red Lotus was chosen because the lotus isn't native to Japan, giving the idea of a machine not built to be top-of-the-line, but to prepare for it.

As for who Charline-san, or Lux-san, is, well, she's one of Tabane's acquaintances. Basically, she was ordered by Tabane to follow up on her Cores, and watch for Cores going mysteriously missing. If one did, she would try and follow up and regain it, before shipping it back to Tabane for redistribution. Of course, she was almost immediately forgotten by Tabane, and when Chloe arrived, she took over that portion. And as for why Lux wasn't identified at any point before, Char actually _gave_ her the name Charline – she never asked for Lux's name, and Lux never bothered to identify herself.

Finally, sorry this one wasn't on "schedule" – its length…well, is excessive and far longer than I usually write (8.1k to my usual 3k or thereabouts). Its length also makes it a little inconsistent in the quality of writing - I'm already noticing a few bits towards the end where Lux goes partially out-of-character or has no explanation for a certain action (and now I absolutely _must_ rewrite the first bit because there is a lot more to Lux than I've written, dammit). The two straight after this will likely be delayed as well, due to the expected size of the chapters and the fact that my exams are coming up. _Nooooooooooooo~_

Now, reviews!

Kerlongsj: I've thought of a lot, yes. I'm actually having to go back and rethink the concept of the story somewhat, since a lot more characters than I anticipated got added in at some point...Of course, I completely forgot about the Gospel's _pilot_ when I was writing that bit, so now I have to somehow explain how she survived 3 months without food or water...*sighs* I wish I could just handwave some of this background creation I'm doing.

Date Started: 12/09/17 (DD/MM/YY)

Rewritten: 3 times (First a change in chapter choice, second an early partial rewrite, third a partial rewrite)

Date Completed: 07/10/17 (DD/MM/YY)


End file.
